The Cave
by shadowglove
Summary: Xover w/ The Cave. While exploring a cave with Kryptonian connections, Chloe and her team become trapped and must find a way out and avoid the creatures within, but will getting out of The Cave truly solve their troubles? chlac, chlyler, Chlex, some Clois
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: I do not own Smallville or The Cave.**

_**A Little Information:**_

_**You can consider this an Alternate Universe because while most things are the same as it is in Superman (Clark Kent is Superman and Lois Lane is his love interest and they work together in the Daily Planet) others are not the same (LIONEL Luthor is the bad guy) while Lex…founder of Lexcorp…is actually a good guy and Chloe's boss.**_

_**Chloe graduated early from highschool due to extra credit and accepted Lex's offer to join Lexcorp as Lex's Representative and to help oversee various Lexcorp projects since he doesn't want to be bothered, and trusts her judgment.**_

_**Chloe IS a Meteor Freak in this story, but she discovered her ability when she saved LEX not LOIS.**_

* * *

"You know that raise you gave me? It _so_ doesn't make up for making me do this." Chloe complained into the satellite telephone to her friend and boss, Lex Luthor. She'd been stationed in the Carpathian mountains for three days now as they finally found an entrance through the collapsed church to the cave below, and while Dr. Nikolai was an interesting man to speak to, and she was in constant communications with Clark and Lois via internet and satellite phone, the young woman was going insane with boredom.

Lex chuckled on the other side of the phone, the sound causing Chloe to close her eyes as nostalgia and a little something else made her shiver. "Another raise and you'll be getting a better salary than the Vice President."

She pouted because he was probably telling her the truth. "I'm going to have to go underwater. Does Vice President Mannings do _that_?"

"Underwater?" Lex's voice was immediately concerned, he knew all about Chloe's fear of darkness and closed-in space due to her many misadventures, namely being buried alive and waking up in the morgue after being pronounced dead when she'd saved his life at the damns when he'd confronted his father about his inhumane experiments against the Meteor Freaks and the man had shot him, leaving him for dead.

"Yeah." Chloe sighed, looking up at the beautiful blue sky that seemed so much more beautiful here in this side of the world. "They did the surface scans, the cave is huge."

"Really?" And yet Lex was sounding less enthused about the project that'd had him sleepless with excitement only nights ago.

"Yeah." Chloe went back inside of her personal tent, trying to be calm as she related to him what Dr. Nikolai had told her only hours ago. "There's a river off the main cavern, and there's _nowhere_ it can come out for at _least_ 90 miles."

"That's a lot."

"_Tell_ me about it." Plopping down on her cot, Chloe winced at the discomfort, realizing with a sneer that ever since graduating and going to work for Lex she'd grown used to the easy life.

"Dr. Jennings, our biologist, has brought in Alex Kim, a cameraman to shoot the whole thing. I've actually seen some of his work on National Geographic, it was really good. They were all underwater scenes as well so I can at least assure you that _he_ is top-notch." She looked up at the top of her tent. "And Dr. Nikolai contacted, whom he assures me, is the best underwater cave spelunking team in the world. They'll be in charge of the whole expedition and he promises me that with this _Jack_ fellow in charge, I have nothing to fear."

"You don't have to do this, Chloe." Lex's voice was tinged with worry and with…with something else. It was the same _something else_ that they'd both been feeling for each other and had been trying to ignore since she was in high school. "I didn't realize the extent to what would have to be done. I'll send someone else to--."

"And lose the little respect they have for me by appearing like a child?" Chloe snapped, angry that Lex would do that to her. "No! They already have little faith in my abilities as overseer of your projects, as your right-hand woman. Hell, Lex, they don't even _see_ me as a woman, they see me as a 19-year-old _girl_. They don't know that I've been working for you since I was seventeen, they don't know that I've been with LexCorp since it began. All they see is a pretty, young face and great breasts."

"You've been listening to Lois' self-help tapes, haven't you?" Lex teased once the last sentence escaped her lips.

"Now, Lex, if I told you I'd have to kill you, wouldn't I?" Chloe giggled, bad mood gone in a second. She sighed. "I just _want_ to do this. I want to prove to them--prove to _myself_--that you gave me this job because I am capable of doing it, _not_ just because you're my friend."

She could _hear_ the tender smile on his face. "You know that I have more faith and trust in you than I have in _anyway_, even Clark."

And that made her smile softly, her cheeks tinting a soft pink hue. "Thank you, Lex. That--that means a lot to me." Hearing the sound of a helicopter outside, she stood up rapidly. "I have to go, I think that the spelunking team arrived, and as the official Representative of LexCorp _and_ yourself, I should be there for the greeting and introductions."

"Take care, Chloe." There was something odd in his voice. "_Promise_ me that you'll be careful."

"Of course I will." She sent him a quick kiss. "Now go do whatever you rich bastards do on your days off."

His laughter was the last thing she heard before she cut off the call and headed out of the tent.

The blonde shielded her gaze from the flying dust with her hand, and watched as the helicopter landed, and it's door swing open. A handsome, dark haired man stepped out, appreciation for the scenery and general excitement visible in his smile.

He was followed out by a handsome bald black man, and a beautiful, petite blonde woman who, judging by the large and heavy backpack she pulled on easily, was a _lot_ stronger than she looked.

"Ah, yes, they have arrived." Dr. Nicolai announced with a smile as he appeared by Chloe's side, grinning with excitement.

"Are you sure they're the best?" Chloe asked, keeping her stance and expression professional. "Mr. Luthor only wants the best."

Dr. Nicolai smiled at her, as if seeing through her façade of cold indifference and seeing the young woman desperate to compete in the adult, _male_ world, and liking her all the more for it. "Of course, Ms. Sullivan, I would only ask for the best with this cave."

"Dr. Nikolai!" They both looked up to see a handsome blonde man with stunning blue eyes approaching them, shouldering a backpack, smile disarming. "It's so good to finally meet you."

"The pleasure is mine." Dr. Nicolai shook his hand with a smile before turning to Chloe. "Ms. Sullivan, I'd like you to meet Jack McAlister, he is the leader of the group."

Chloe shook the hand the blonde offered her. "Nice to meet you."

"Jack." Dr. Nicolai went on to say. "This is Ms. Sullivan, the representative of Mr. Lex Luthor and LexCorp—who are _funding_ this expedition."

Jack blinked in surprised, looking Chloe up and down as if unable to believe that the tiny, 5'4 blonde could hold so much power in her small, delicate and soft hands. "It's a pleasure to meet you, ma'am. And on behalf of my team I'd like to thank you for letting us do this."

"No need to thank us, we were told that you were the best." She explained, pulling her hand from his. "And Mr. Luthor will only have the best."

Jack suddenly grinned brightly. "Good to know that."

Dr. Nicolai clapped Jack on the back. "Let me show you around."

"What do we got?" Jack grinned, obviously excited to do this. They began to walk away before the handsome leader of the spelunking team stopped and looked back at her. "Not coming, Ms. Sullivan?"

Surprised that he actually _expected_ her to do things and not just look pretty, as most of the people on this dig did, Chloe gave him her first, genuine smile. "No thanks, I've already seen it all, _twice_."

Jack paused for a second, his gaze roaming her face, before he smiled softer. "Well, we'll be seeing each other later then." And with that he turned back to Dr. Nicolai, who grinned at both of them before continuing on in his tour.

"That's the main cave, hidden under a church." The Russian was explaining as they walked towards said find. "And half of the mountainside."

Watching them go, Chloe shook her head and went to find Dr. Kathryn Jennings, the only friend she'd made while camping here. The older woman could understand the fact of being looked down on because one happened to be attractive, and they'd spent the nights in each other's tents, talking about themselves and becoming close friends.

The blonde, used to the feeling of eyes on her, ignored _this_ one as she headed towards the tent and found Kathryn looking into a microscope. She waved at Alex Kim, the cameraman Dr. Jennings had brought with her, before turning to the good doctor herself. "What are you looking at?"

"This _microbe _we found growing at the entrance of the cave." Kathryn announced, not taking her eyes from the scope. "It's the oddest thing _ever_."

"Really?" Chloe asked, turning to look at the screen where the amplified version of what Kathryn was examining could be seen. She tilted her head to the side and observed the green thing, feeling quite ignorant. "Why?"

"Well," Kathryn sighed, adjusting the zoom. "To _begin_--."

"Hi," A strong, male voice said from behind Chloe.

She jerked and turned to look into the face of the handsome, dark haired man she'd seen leaving the helicopter. _He must be a part of the spelunking team then. _"Hello."

Kathryn ignored them, continuing to observe the microbe. "_Fascinating_."

"What's so fascinating about that green blotch?" Chloe wanted to know, turning from the handsome stranger towards the monitor once more, feeling frustrated.

Kathryn chuckled softly to herself in amusement, but didn't offer any explanation.

Chloe glared at the scientist before turning back to the dark haired man, who was still there behind her. "How may I help you?"

Her obvious annoyance seemed to amuse him. "I'm Tyler McAlister." He grinned a boyish smile that was quickly melting her annoyed expression. "I'm the first scout."

McAlister? Apparently good looks and roguish charm was a family trait.

She smiled at him in amusement. "I'm Chloe Sullivan, legal representative of Alexander Luthor, _funder_ of this exposition." For some reason she felt morbid satisfaction at his surprise. "And this is Dr. Jennings."

Kathryn didn't look up from her microscope, making a quick note on a piece of paper next to her. _"Fascinating_."

Chloe glared playfully at her before motioning to the Asian man going over the camera equipment. "And this is Alex Kim, our cameraman."

Tyler waved to Alex and the other man did the same before returning to his cameras.

Chloe grinned, watching as Tyler set down his equipment on the table next Kathryn's. The blonde eyed the equipment with interest. "What exactly is that anyway?"

Tyler's grin went from cute to adoringly proud. "It's a rebreather."

"_Rebreather_?" Chloe frowned, feeling more and more stupid as she hung out with these people.

"It's like an oxygen tank, but better." Tyler tried explaining, looking more comfortable now that they were talking about this. "With normal tanks you breathe in oxygen and that's it, but with a rebreather you actually _recycle_ your oxygen so you can use it again."

"I didn't know that was possible." Chloe blinked, impressed.

"Yeah, it is." Tyler grinned, tapping the rebreather unit with pride. "You breathe in one tube, exhale the other, and it cleans it so that there is no more carbon dioxide, and it adds a little more oxygen into it, and viola, you can reuse the same air."

"It's preferred for these kind of dives." Kathryn spoke up, finally looking up from her microscope at them. Her shrewd gaze rested on the rebreather and she straightened, eyebrow raised. "It's unusual for a rebreather. Who modified it?"

He seemed surprised that she'd noticed the difference. "That would be my brother, Jack."

_Aha--so they ARE brothers_.

"Really?" Kathryn asked as Tyler began to undo the top of the rebreather and let her see the inside.

"Yeah." Tyler nodded. "But I did all of the reprogramming, though."

Chloe raised her eyebrow. To anyone else that wouldn't have seemed odd, but she could sense the slight defensiveness in his tone.

_Sibling competition, much?_

"Why the canister?" Kathryn asked.

"We're using lithium hydroxide to filter out the CO2." Tyler explained. "It's a little dangerous, but it's much more effective than calcium."

Kathryn looked impressed.

Chloe _knew_ she looked as lost as she felt.

Alex came up from behind Kathryn and picked up a piece of the equipment, looking it over with interest. "Hope you got a redundancy for this meg."

"There's actually a _triple_ redundancy." Tyler announced. "It's the backup, a primary, and a HUD."

Kathryn turned to look at Chloe with an even _more_ impressed look before returning her attention to Tyler McAlister. "So you can stay submerged for what, 18, 20 hours?"

"Twenty-four." Tyler grinned at Kathryn and his gaze slipped past her to Chloe.

Chloe met his gaze and a small smile curled the sides of her lips, realizing that despite the fact that Kathryn was older, prettier, and _far_ more knowledgeable, Tyler McAlister was grinning at _her_.

"Kate, Alex." Dr. Nicolai's voice caused them all to turn around and Chloe's gaze immediately met that of the eldest McAlister. "This is Jack McAlister."

"Dr. Jennings." Kathryn shook his hand professionally.

"It's a pleasure." Jack replied sincerely.

"We read about some of your Yucatan expeditions." Kathryn announced, smiling. "Pretty amazing."

"Thank you." Jack pulled away, eyes downcast, looking a little uncomfortable with the praise.

Intrigued, Chloe smiled at the handsome, blonde brother.

Jack's gaze darted up from the ground and quickly met hers.

She blushed and looked away, but not before noticing his grin.

"And I understand you have a great interest in cave biology, Mr. McAlister."

Chloe wondered why Kathryn sounded amused, so she looked at her friend and her eyes widened when she realized that the doctor was looking from Jack to her with a knowing little glint in her eyes.

Jack seemed to have picked up on it too, because he was looking more and more embarrassed. "I'm starting to."

Chloe noticed Tyler shaking his head to her right, and she wondered what it was about those brothers that had them so competitive towards each other.

"And it's just Jack, please."

Kathryn looked at Chloe in amusement, her eyes saying _I like this one, make a move_, before she smiled at the eldest McAlister. "Kathryn." She grinned brighter. "Perhaps you wanna see some samples we took?"

"Yeah, yeah, sure." Jack nodded, beginning to follow Kathryn to her microscope. He reached Tyler. "Hey bro." He smiled. "Double-check all the rebreathers."

"Yeah. One in 14." Tyler nodded, tense.

Jack shook his head and followed Kathryn towards the little laboratory she'd set up in the back of the tent.

Chloe watched them go with a raised eyebrow before turning to Tyler, who was looking down at the rebreather unit in his hand. "You two have the sibling competition thing down to an art, huh?"

He looked up at her in surprise, as if he'd expected to be left alone. "I thought you'd go see those samples?"

She grinned and shook her head. "Nah, I don't understand those sort of things, and while Kathryn does her best to explain them to me, I just end up feeling stupid."

He grinned brightly, his face lighting up immediately. "Boy do _I_ understand that."

"What you said to him, to Jack, 1 in 14…what does that mean?" Chloe asked, picking up a piece of the rebreather he was examining and looking at it as if it were an alien artifact.

"It's the number of divers that die each year."

Tyler explained, returning to checking the equipment, a tranquil, comfortable _lull_ passing between them.

"Ms. Sullivan."

Chloe looked up and was nearly blinded by the flash of light. "Alex Kim! You're going to _blind_ me one of these days!"

The handsome Asian smiled unrepentantly at her from behind his camera lens. "I wanted to get a picture of you where you didn't look like you'd sucked on a lemon."

Tyler snickered.

Chloe mock-glared at the Asian man, whom she liked more and more as they hung out together. "One day, Alex, _one day_…"

"Promises _promises_." Alex taunted juvenilely.

Chloe rolled her eyes, grin bright, before turning to Tyler, who was watching her with a smile.

The younger McAlister noticed a plastic Ziploc bag and a decaying piece of material inside. "What's this?"

"It's all that's left of some poor guy they found in the mouth of the cave." Alex explained, looking up from his camera.

Chloe nodded, making a face at the remains. "It's also where they found the microorganisms that Kathryn finds so _fascinating_."

Alex turned and grinned at Chloe. "You know that she goes on like that just to pique your curiosity, right?"

Chloe gasped and Tyler laughed at her outraged expression.

* * *

"12 _days_?"

Chloe winced as she walked under the moonlight that night after leaving the group meeting in the communal tent. "No need to _shout_, Lex." She sighed, running a shaky hand through her wind-blown hair. "I'm nervous enough as it is."

"I refuse to let you do that, it's _insane_!" Lex's voice rang loudly through the satellite phone, _so_ loudly that Chloe had to pull the phone from her ear, and yet she could still hear him perfectly clear. "I am _not_ letting you risk this!"

"_Lex_, just, _listen_ to me. We're doing this tomorrow and you _need_ a representative there, and I _want_ to do this, despite the fact that it scares the _shit_ out of me." She stopped and looked up at the sky. "Jack analyzed the readouts, he says that there's an _enormous_ cavern about 300 feet down just below the cave entrance. Dr. Nicolai's already named it Titan Hall because of how _amazingly large_ it really is."

Lex was silent, listening.

"There's a sump, which leads to some underwater passageway--."

"I don't see how you would want to do this, it's--."

"Let me finish, Lex." Sighing, Chloe continued on. "We're going to try and find a dry cavern somewhere in the system where we can set up advance base camp, and Dr. Nicolai and Kat--Dr. Jennings--, can gather their samples." She paused. "And I will look for what we need found."

Lex sighed in aggravation. "Chloe, look, they aren't that important. I don't want you to get hurt just because of some legend--."

"Lex," she sighed. "I _want_ to do this. If that Kawatche legend was right, then this should be _it_. It should be _there_."

"But I just can't put my head around _how_ the _Kawatche Indians_ would know about something happening in _Romania_."

"We've seen stranger things, Lex. This is _Childs Play_."

"I just wish you weren't the player."

"I'm going to be in the hands of the best." Chloe sighed, walking towards the entrance of the cave, not even realizing that she wasn't alone anymore. "Lex, nothing is going to happen to me, I'm going to be fine. And it's only 12 days. Right? I mean, you can live without my nagging for that long."

He didn't even chuckle. "Chloe, I don't want you doing this. If I'd realized--I only thought you'd have to go there, look pretty, and, I don't know--I haven't been on top of this project, you know I left it in your hands from day one." There was a sigh of agitation. "If I'd known that you would have to go underwater, _in a fucking cave_ for 12 days--."

"I _need_ to do this, Lex, and Dr. Nicolai has trust in this team, and they look professional." She closed her eyes, tired. "There aren't a lot of people who inspire trust from me, but Jack does, and I think--."

"This is the second time you've mentioned this _Jack_," there was something odd in Lex's voice. "Who exactly _is_ he?"

"Jack McAlister." Chloe frowned, wondering what was wrong with Lex. "He's the leader of the team. Look, Lex, I know that I'm one of the only people you can trust in, and that you take care of the few friends you have, but you have to let me do this. How dangerous can it be?"

There was a wry chuckle on the other end of the satellite. "You should know by now never to say that. Every time you do you almost die."

"And yet I always seem to survive." She grimaced, remembering how her meteor powers were very well the reason for that. The blonde sighed and turned, freezing when she saw Jack McAlister crouching over the side of the entrance to the excavated ruins of the church. "Lex, I have to go, okay?"

"Call me before you leave."

"I will." She smiled before hanging up, placing the satellite phone in her back pocket, and smiling at Jack. "Hey. I thought you were with the others, you know, having a drink and reliving embarrassing old times together?"

He grinned at her, standing. "Nah. I don't like to drink before doing a job."

"I like that policy." Chloe smiled, looking down at the darkness in the hole in the ground, and the metal ladder leading down into the depths. "So, you here for a reason or were you just _so_ excited about tomorrow?"

His blue eyes went to the darkness of the hole. "I can't help but keep wondering, _why_ build a _church_ all the way up here? It doesn't make any sense. Why _here_?"

"I might be able to help you with that." Chloe _finally_ felt useful. "I asked that myself when Lex found out that this place might exist, and I did some research. That, along with the tiles and certain artifacts we've been able to uncover at this dig prove that my theory was correct." She grinned proudly. Kathryn knew microbes, Jack and Tyler knew caves, _she_ knew myths. "They built the church to seal the cave as a display of God's protective power."

"Who's _they_?" Jack asked, seeming truly interested.

"Holy men." Chloe smirked, looking down at the darkness of the hole. "And not only Romanian either. There are certain writings down there, in the church, that are English, Latin, and other languages, proving that holy men from all over the world had something to do with the sealing of this cave."

Jack frowned, his blue eyes searching hers. "Makes you wonder _why_ they'd go to all of that trouble just to seal this cave."

She appreciated his openness of mind. Most people would scoff at how 'superstitious' the people of the 'olden days' had been, and yet Jack seemed _cautious_. "Well, we were able to salvage a mosaic from the church, and it tells a story about the Knights Templar."

"The _Templars_?" Jack blinked.

"Yeah." She nodded, leaning in closer as if sharing a secret. "It tells the story of the Templars entering the cave and fighting these winged _demons_."

"Demons, huh?" He raised an eyebrow at her and smirked.

"Yep." She smirked back.

"Did the Templars win?" He finally asked, earning points in her book for not just sneering and shaking his head in disbelief.

"Unfortunately, _no_." Chloe frowned, remembering _why_ she hadn't shared this little information with Lex. "The creatures won, and to make sure that they didn't come up and destroyed mankind, the cave was sealed."

"Well, I'm glad those things really don't exist." Jack laughed, somewhat nervously, looking down into the darkness as well. "I've swam with sharks, but _demons_? Um, I would really like to pass on that one."

"I would pass on the swimming with the sharks bit myself." She grinned at him, glad that she _too_ didn't believe in demons. Sure, she'd seen from freaky shit in Smallville, but those were because of the meteor rocks, and she doubted that this had anything to do with that. Still, she hadn't told Lex about the legend because she knew him, knew that he'd _force_ her to come home if he'd found out about it.

"It's not half as dangerous as they make it out in the movies." He grinned, tilting his head to the side and watching her. "As long as you don't get stupid it's safe, and it's also the adrenaline rush of the century. It's amazing to swim next to those creatures. They're underwater _tanks_." Dimples appeared in each cheek. "I'll have to take you along with me one of these days."

"Thanks, but no thanks." Chloe shivered, hugging herself, smile gone. "I'm terrified of things like that. I mean, I'm terrified of the dark, and of closed spaces, and just the _thought_ of being down there for 12 days gives me the shakes."

He frowned. "Then why are you here, Ms. Sullivan?"

"Chloe, call me Chloe." She smiled weakly at him. "I have no intention of calling you Mr. McAlister, so you might as well just call me Chloe."

"_Chloe…" _He smiled softly at her. "Why are you doing this if it frightens you?"

She looked up, green eyes meeting blue ones. "Because some things are more important than one's fears."

He grinned. "I agree." Hearing drunken laughter from the communal tent, Jack sighed and turned to look at her. "Why don't I walk you back to your tent?"

Smiling, she nodded, and they walked side by side in silence into the darkness around them.

* * *

Well, I will update when the DVD I ordered of The Cave arrives (should be this week or next) and I'd like to know what y'all thought about this idea. Oh well, have a great night! And review?


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer: I do not own Smallville or The Cave or any characters mentioned in either. I, unfortunately, also don't own Lex Luthor (Michael Rosenbaum would be more than sufficient), Jack McAlister, OR Tyler McAlister either. Shucks. My life SUCKS man!**

_Hey everyone! I'm back with the second chapter to THE CAVE! Sorry it took so long, but the DVD only arrived from AMAZON yesterday (the first chapter was written after watching a rented copy of THE CAVE) and so I finished washing and cleaning and doing all the icky household things I decided that the first that I'd do (after bathing because DAAAAAYYYUM it was hot!) was to do the next chapter for all of you! Hope you enjoy this!_

* * *

Titan Hall was the most beautiful sight she'd ever seen. The journey there had been somewhat heart-threatening though because she'd had to choose from climbing down a ricketty ladder or rappelling down the _long_ drop to the inner chamber of Titan Hall. Ever since she'd been thrown out of the window of Lex's Smallville castle when she'd interviewed him that first time, well, she'd been scared of heights, but Chloe had refused to let the others realize this.

Since most of the others had chosen rappelling because it seemed to be the quicker and safer of the two options, Chloe had chosen it as well, and had gone down earlier than some of the team, right along with Kathryn, Alex, and Dr. Nikolai, and while Kathryn and Dr. Nicolai took samples, and Alex began taking pictures and some film exerts to start off the beginning of the documentary of their adventures, Chloe stood a ways off, observing the untouched beauty of Titan Hall.

She ignored the others who'd put up the protective tents and stationed their technical equipment under them, she ignored the people who installed the large balloons of light that lit up the dark hall, she even managed to somehow ignore Jack and his team as they came down and got their first look at the awe-inspiring place.

Stalagmites and Stalactites decorated different areas of the cave though most of it was smooth rock. Clear water rose up from below them, and the lights from the different lanterns and equipment gave it different colored reflections. Something eerie yet_ magical_ filled the walls, and it wasn't exactly the moss that grew on the sides of the water-covered stones that she was talking about.

"Pre-dive checklist."

She could hear Top, one of Jack's men, talking.

"O2 sensors, calibrated?"

Briggs, another of Jack's team, answered. "Calibrated, check."

"Oxygen running at 0.4?" Top read from the checklist.

"0.4. Check." Briggs called out.

Chloe peeked out from behind one of the large natural rock pillars that kept the cavern up, and noticed that Briggs was in full suit, in the water, going over the gadgets while Top read to him from the checklist. She'd never seen the procedure before and was curious, watching them as they spoke.

"Now, you find it, you name it." Top spoke, sounding like a tired father telling his son the rules _once more_ just in case. "Make it good."

"First scout's privilege, Top." Briggs grinned cheekily at the other man. "I got a few ideas. You know I'll come up with something."

Chloe frowned. Briggs was the first scout? Hadn't _Tyler_ said he was the first scout?

"_Okay_." Top shook his head, looking down at his watch as Tyler came up behind him, carrying some equipment. "Synchronize watches to 0811 on my mark. Three, two, one…mark." Both he and Briggs pressed down on a button on their watches that caused them to beep.

"All okay?" Tyler asked from besides him, a conflicted look on his face as Jack and Charlie appeared.

"I don't think it could be any better, Ty." Briggs's grin in Tyler's direction was smug, like he knew that he was getting one over the other guy and liked it.

"Yeah," Tyler shook his head, trying to smile. "I bet."

Jack stepped into the water, wearing a pair of sweatpants and a shirt. "Alright, here we go." He bent near Briggs, handing him his helmet. "This is a long passage, so I want you to pace yourself."

"Yeah." Briggs nodded, putting the helmet on.

"Tunaround's one-third, okay?" Jack reminded, his voice conveying how important this was.

"I find a dry cavern, I'll give you a call, Jack." Briggs smiled, and once again it rubbed Chloe the wrong way.

Her gaze ventured to Tyler, who shook his head, obviously finding it hard to keep his smile anything other than sardonic as he folded his muscular arms over his chest and watched his obvious rival take his place on the team and disappear under the water.

The men and Charlie then went to the computer where they could see all the images Brigg's camera was capturing, and could communicate with him. Chloe watched them talking to Briggs, not being able to hear what any of them said, but from the way Tyler suddenly tensed and moved away slightly, and the way the others were looking and him and then at the communicating device in slight irritation, it was obvious that Briggs had said something arrogant that'd ticked Tyler off. Probably had mentioned once more that _he_ was the first scout and Tyler wasn't.

Jack patted Strode's back and went towards where Tyler was off to the side, busy putting order to equipment in an obvious way of letting out pent up frustration. "We need you ready around 0100 hours, all right?"

Chloe backed away, not willing to spy on this obvious confrontation in the making, but she winced when her foot got caught in a crevice. Tugging at the foot caused her to bite down on her lip to keep from yelping in pain as the stone seemed to dig into her sneaker.

"Oh, I've _been_ready." Tyler announced, his voice unable to hide his annoyance.

Jack turned back towards him from where he'd been retreating. The sag of his shoulders proved that he knew there would be a confrontation and he dreaded it. "You got something to say, say it."

Tyler turned to his brother. "You know I'm the best scout."

"That may be so," Jack sighed as he turned around and walked away from the fight. "But I can count on Briggs."

Tyler watched his brother and then shook his head, a hurt looked on his face as he stormed away--ironically, he stormed towards Chloe. She was silent, trying to mold into the pillar and hope that he would just pass her and not notice her, but he stopped right as he was about to do that and turned to look at her, his hurt expression morphing into confused amusement.

"Are we playing hide and seek and no one told me?" He grinned at her.

She glared at him. "No, we are _not_." Chloe sighed, motioning down to her trapped foot. "I got stuck."

"Nike." He commented, bending to his knees and surveying the situation with obvious amusement. "Not exactly my choice of footwear, but I gotta commend you for not going wearing heels or something like that."

"You know, despite the fact that the whole world thinks otherwise, blondes are _not_ stupid, it's the _dyed_ blondes that give us a bad name." She informed him, feeling somewhat silly as he tilted his head from side to side, obviously quite enthralled with the current situation as he gave her foot an experimental tug, which caused her to yelp in pain and threaten to kick him with her free foot.

"You'll have to undo your laces and try get out of the shoe itself." Tyler announced after his lengthy investigation, looking up at her with a grin on his face. "Didn't think it'd be that _easy_ to unlace you."

She mustered a crooked grin at that innuendo as he began to undo her shoelaces. "You wish, McAlister, you _wish_."

"So," Tyler announced as he pulled back the tongue of her sneaker and grabbed her free hand, as she placed the other on his back for leverage and pulled her foot out of her sneaker. "You heard what went down with me and Jack."

"Uh, not _intentionally._" Chloe balanced on one leg as Tyler tugged her sneaker out from the crevice and waved it tauntingly at her. "Give that to me."

"Such a princess." He teased, passing her the shoe and grinning at her when she bent and put it back on. Tyler's grin left however by the time she'd straightened and looked back at him. "You know, I want to thank you, you're the first person who hasn't given me a pitying look ever since Jack made Briggs first scout."

"You don't look like a man who would appreciate pity." Chloe said truthfully. "But it doesn't take a genius to figure out that you really wanted to be the first scout on this job."

"Yeah." He smiled sadly, looking down at his feet. "I just wanna be the first in a place nobody's ever been."

"You sound like Le--Mr. Luthor." Chloe announced, ignoring the silent question Tyler sent her at the slip up. "He is always trying to visit new frontiers, try new things, test the new and not the tried, and if he finds something unique, something special, something _rare,_ he wants to put his name on it, claim it."

"Is that what he's done with you?" Tyler asked.

Chloe blinked, looking at him in surprise, trying to fight the blush rising up the side of her neck. "I don't know what you're talking about."

Tyler watched her in silence for a moment before shaking his head and looking out at the peaceful water longingly. "You not going to ask me _why_ I'm not first scout?"

"Figured you'd tell me if you wanted to." She replied, stepping besides him and looking out at the water as well, hands in her pockets.

He sent her a sideways smile at that. "My brother and I had a problem some months back while on a job." Tyler was once more serious, looking at the water. "I got a little cocky, didn't listen to his orders, and I nearly got Charlie killed."

Chloe winced.

"Yeah, she's like a little sister to us so it was a harder blow." Tyler sighed. "Jack and I haven't been on the best terms since."

"Hey _Ty_!"

They both turned and looked at Jack.

"You wanna come?" Tyler asked her.

Chloe nodded and followed him as they made their way to where Strode, Top and Jack were looking at a monitor filled with static.

"What's up?" Tyler asked.

"If Briggs doesn't show in 10, I'm sending you." Jack announced, eyes on the screen, rubbing his fingers together in a sign of nervousness.

"Come on." Tyler snorted. "It's Briggs. He's probably showing off."

"What's going on?" Chloe asked, frowning.

Strode turned to look at her. "We lost contact with Briggs a while ago when he went darkside, but we should have gotten reconnected with him by now."

"Oh." Her eyes widened.

"Listen, you're probably right," Jack told Tyler, obviously ignored the sub-conversation going on between the others. "But go get ready anyway, okay?"

Tyler sighed. "Okay."

"Wait, what's that?" Chloe asked, pointing to the screen.

"Jack!" Strode called in excitement. "We got him."

_"Wakey-wakey Titan Hall!_" Brigg's outline in the darkness grinned smugly at them.

"Oh, Jesus." Top muttered to Strode's right as everyone crowded around to see better.

"Is anybody up there?" Briggs smirked. "Or have you all gone to sleep on me while I do all the real work?"

"No one's sleeping, you arrogant bastard." Charlie announced with a laugh as she appeared by Jack's side. "Where are you? Everything's so dark we can only see a little bit of your ugly mug."

"Mean girl." Briggs grinned at her. "And as to the question of where I am, well, I'd say I'm sitting at advance base camp, which will now be forever known as Kublai Khan."

Charlie rolled her eyes.

Jack chuckled. "About how far in would you say, Briggs?"

"Ohhh…" Briggs looked around him in the darkness dramatically. "Only about 2.4 miles, Jack."

"Fantastic!" Strode clapped his hands.

"Two-point-four." Charlie pumped the air with her fist in excitement.

"I'm uploading the date now." Briggs' voice could be heard but the screen was now showing the data being uploaded. "Read it and weep." The monitor blinked into life when it finished uploading, showing his trajectory. "It's amazing in here, man." The data was saved to the computer and the screen once more showed the filming Briggs was doing in the cave, his meager beam of light only showing patches of what had the potential of being a very large sub-cavern. "I haven't seen a hole like this in a long time." Suddenly the camera shook. "Oh _shit_!"

"Briggs?" Top asked, as worry filled them.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah." Brigg's voice was getting distorted and static beginning to fill the screen. "Hold on a sec. Something just ran past me."

"Ran past--?" Chloe asked, clutching her hand to her heart. Were there living _things_ down there?

"Got it!" Briggs called out victoriously, pulling up a viciously fighting, small, mole-like creature into the view. "Is Kathryn or Dr. Nicolai around?"

"_Fascinating_."

Chloe jumped when she heard the Russian's voice behind her, not having heard him when he'd arrived.

"Dr. Nicolai!" Briggs struggled a little with the creature. "Can you see this? It's some kind of large rat or a mole or something."

The noises from the creature attracted Alex Kim and Kathryn, who both shared a disgusted expression before returning their attention to the screen.

"Buckteeth, webbed feet." Briggs continued with his description of the creature. "Looks a lot like Tyler."

Even Tyler managed a small smile at that given the circumstances.

Suddenly the thing got loose. "No--!" Briggs was heard crying out as the camera topped over and the screen went black.

"You alright man?" Jack asked, concerned.

"_Shit_." Briggs picked up the camera and his face was once more shown. "Yeah." He gazed to his right. "What the fu--?"

Everyone shared a laugh, everyone but Chloe, who hugged herself and rubbed her suddenly chilled arms.

"I think I pissed him off with that Tyler comment." Briggs smart-mouthed once more.

"Hey listen man." Jack leaned forwards. "Good work. We still have some things that need to be finished up here before we start for over there, so you should try get some sleep."

"Yeah, yeah." Briggs nodded. "Some sleep"

"You need anything down there, man?" Strode asked.

"Hold a sec." Briggs frowned, looking at something above him. His cocky smile disappeared in a second and he went pale.

At the same time the equipment began to give trouble, the image on the screen wavering.

"Briggs." Top spoke.

"Yeah." Brigg's eyes never left whatever it was that he was looking at. "Yeah. Hold on, guys. There's--I'm gonna try to get—" the image continued to malfunction. "There's something that--."

The image left suddenly, but you could still hear Brigg's voice.

"What just happened?" Jack asked, agitated.

"Could be the feedback." Strode frowned.

"_What the hell was that_?" Briggs' could be heard gasping. "_Goddamn it!_"

"Briggs." Top's voice was calm despite everything. "Key me if you can hear me."

Everything suddenly went silent.

Strode leaned over Top to check something in the system and sighed, sitting back in his seat. "Fiber optic must have snapped."

"Maybe we should send in a second scout just to be safe." Top said slowly, turning to Jack and Tyler.

Tyler made a face. "No. Come on. We gotta get in the water."

Jack nodded his agreement before turning to Kathryn and Dr. Nicolai. "We're going in earlier than planned, so get whatever it is you need done _now_, whatever extracts you can wait to get when we return--wait."

Kathryn nodded and grabbed Chloe, pulling her along with her as they made their way away from the others. "You look a little pale."

"Did you _see_ that thing?" Chloe shivered, remembering the creature.

"Yes, it was _fascinating_." Kathryn grinned broadly, clearly excited. "I'd love to be able to capture one and study it. It seemed _albino_, didn't it? But that'd make sense considering that it probably has never seen the light of the sun before."

"But how can there be life down there?" Chloe whispered, looking at the scientist, a little unnerved at how _happy and excited_ she was.

"Chloe, don't you get it?" Kathryn asked. "We haven't just stumbled upon a new, highly developed cave system—we could have found a new _ecosystem_, filled with its own established life forms, and species we've never even known existed!"

Yeah, she knew, and that was what worried her.

"Think of the amazing things we're going to see down there, Chloe." Kathryn announced as they hurried to gather her things together. "I'm so happy that Lexcorp chose me to be the one for this, what we're going to do, it's going to go down in history."

Chloe paused as she looked at the elder woman. "Doesn't it worry you? The unknown?"

"Nah." Kathryn continued to pack her things. "I'd give my life for science."

"You're crazy." Chloe laughed, shaking her head and running her hands through her hair in a nervous gesture.

Kathryn only smiled. "You need help getting your things ready?"

"Nah." Chloe looked away, focusing her green gaze onto the smooth, crystalline water. "I'm really not bringing much of anything with me." _Except for the pictures in the water-sealed container and some other things that no one else will know of._ She felt a little bad for the deception on her part, but she knew that it was important for her to check this out and see if the information in the parchments found in the newly discovered, secret chamber of the Kawatche caves was true.

The blonde sighed and continued to look at the water. "I have to call Le—Mr. Luthor before I go under, I promised him I would do that, and he's not going to be happy with our timetable shifting. He's not happy about this situation at all, and the fact that it isn't going as planned isn't going to help him in control--and to remain stoic and cool, Lex has to be in control." She smirked slightly, realizing that she was probably one of the only people who didn't hold that particular quality against Lex.

"Chloe, can I ask you something without you getting offended?"

The blonde turned to the elder woman, tense. "Depends on the question."

"Fair enough." Kathryn nodded. "What sort of relationship do you have with Mr. Luthor?" She asked. "It's just that you are so _young_--."

"To be his right-hand?" Chloe sighed, picking up one of Kathryn's instruments and looking at it in silence. "I hear that a lot you know. Most people probably think that I earned my position on my back with my feet in the air, but I didn't. I've been friends with Lex since I was a junior in high school."

Kathryn's eyes widened.

"My best friend and at the time _crush_ saved Lex from drowning when he drove off of a bridge, and I met Lex through Clark. Certain events happened that caused us to spend time together, and we developed a strong affinity and respect for the other." Chloe smiled. "When I graduated from high school a year early thanks to my extra credits, my goal was to be a writer for the Daily Planet, but Lex asked me to do a favor for him and work as Lexcorp's PR. Lexcorp was just beginning, and Lex needed a lot of help with the _image_ of Lexcorp. I was only supposed to help him for about a year, but I fell in love with my job, and Lex isn't a people's person, and he doesn't trust a lot of people, so he made me his spokesperson, his right-hand-woman."

"Wow." Kathryn looked at Chloe up and down as if she hadn't really noticed her before, a small smile touching her lips. "You know, I thought you were going to be a crotchey old woman from what I heard about you."

"Huh?" Chloe's eyes went wide.

"All I'd heard of was the _intimidating Ms. Sullivan_, and the men all seemed somewhat afraid of you, so when I saw this young blonde girl in a business suit I was floored." The elder woman admitted. "Then, I'll admit, I thought you were some blonde-bimbo trash that got the job by other merits, but from the moment you first opened your mouth and started to talk, I knew you weren't a bimbo."

"Uh, I think I should be saying _thanks_, but I'm not too sure about that."

Kathryn grinned. "Believe me, I like you, that's a large compliment."

"_Uh-huh_."

"Excuse me, ladies." Jack's voice caused them to turn to see the sandy-blonde-haired man behind them. "I need to talk to Chloe."

Kathryn grinned brighter. "She's all yours."

Chloe sent the older woman a look before following Jack as he moved away from Kathryn and towards the water. "Is there a problem, Jack?"

He looked out into the water. "You didn't tell me that you've never dove before."

She winced, realizing that Kathryn must have shared that information with someone else and the news had gotten back to Jack. "The closest I've ever got to any sort of diving is snorkeling in the Caribbean a couple of summers back when Lex decided we needed a vacation."

Jack turned and gave her a curious look before shaking his head and returning his gaze to the water. "I'll give you a quick lesson before we get into the water, and once we _are_ in the water you're going to stay by my side at all times, no matter what happens, you stay close enough for me to be able to reach out and grab you if I have to."

Chloe frowned, not liking the tone he was using on her. _She_ was the superior on this job, if it hadn't been for _her _he and his team wouldn't be here in the first place.

"I want to be able to get to you in a second if you're in trouble."

Okay, she wasn't so angry anymore. A small smile touched her lips as she looked out at the water in front of them.

"I saw the look on your face when you saw the rat-thing Briggs caught."

She blinked and turned her head to look at him, surprised to find him watching her. She'd thought that Jack had been only concentrating on Briggs at the time, hadn't noticed him looking at her.

"Webbed feet means that it's probably a swimmer," Jack warned. "So while the thing is obviously mean but harmless, we might find some during the swim to Kublai Khan, and I don't want you to panic. I've seen people do things like pulling their masks off, or racing away and getting lost in the cave, and end up drowning because of it. I also know that you're terrified enough as it is of the diving, and you don't know what to do, so the risk is greater."

Chloe hated to admit a weakness, but she nodded.

"I normally would refuse to let you in the water considering that you don't have any idea about what to do," he confessed, giving her a sheepish smile. "But you're the boss, and I don't want to get kicked off of this job. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity."

"It is." _You have no idea._

"So I want you to swim next to me, shoulder to shoulder." His gaze roamed her face, expression serious. "If something happens, if for whatever reason you get panicked, I want you to get my attention, grab my hand and squeeze." He reached for her hand and squeezed.

Chloe's heart raced in her chest as his thumb softly rubbed the curve of her palm in a calming manner.

"I want you to only look at my face, don't look anywhere else--no matter _what_ is going on around us, and calm your breathing. I need you to trust me and do exactly as I tell you." His voice was soothing, and the sound of it along with the feel of his thumb against the skin of her palm calmed Chloe immediately. "I need you to do that for me. I need you to trust me."

Chloe felt the tension drain out of her body, and she looked up at his through her eyelashes. God, this guy was _good_! If it hadn't been for the fact that she'd started having a small electric shock the first time she touched other Metahumans she would have thought that he had some sort of power.

She hadn't even noticed that she'd leaned in a little towards him, eyes half-closed, hand in his, his thumb still caressing her palm.

The sound of someone clearing his throat in slight irritation caused Chloe to pull her hand from Jack's and turn around to see Tyler McAlister.

"Jack, Dr. Nicolai wants to talk to you." The dark haired man told his brother.

Jack nodded, turning his attention back to Chloe. "Please get your things ready and get changed into your wetsuit. We'll go over that quick lesson in a couple of minutes."

Chloe nodded and walked passed Tyler, going to get ready.

* * *

The lesson had been quick and basic but as they jumped into the water, beginning their journey to Kublai Khan, Chloe felt a little better than she had at the beginning. The water was clear and yet shadows danced all around them thanks to the darkness of the area and the brightness of their lights.

"All right." Top's voice could be heard saying through the mic in his mask as he swam up ahead with a large light. "Let's take it a little slow."

Chloe had a feeling that swimming in the front of the pack was usually Jack's position, but the blonde was swimming shoulder to shoulder with her, and she'd caught him sending her discreet sideways glances, making sure that she was fine. The blonde had to admit that the handsome leader of the cave diving/spelunking team was the only reason she felt safe…that and the fact that with her healing and resurrection powers she was very hard to kill—or at least remain dead…then again, she'd never _drowned_ before and didn't know exactly if she'd wake up from _that_.

So that kept her cautious.

"We're right on your tail, mate." Strode's voice announced.

They entered through a small crevice in the cave, entering another unit, and as the others followed, Chloe hung back, heart beginning to beat rapidly at the darkness inside. She'd been buried alive once, and ever since that'd happened she was afraid of dark, enclosed spaces.

She felt a hand grab hers and she jerked at the feeling, heart seeming to jump to her throat and back as she turned to look at Jack. His hand rubbed hers in that same soothing fashion, and he didn't speak, just looked at her until she nodded that she was ready, that she could do this.

_He didn't speak because he didn't want the others realizing how terrified I am…_

She smiled softly to herself and let Jack lead her through the crevice, only letting go when it got too narrow for them to pass through together. He gave her a little shove and helped her through, making sure she went first and wasn't left behind, before appearing by her side inside of the dark, underwater cavern they were now swimming through.

Chloe looked below, shivering slightly at the stalagmites that rose up from the floor and seemed to try and reach for her.

_Stop imaging things, _she growled to herself.

"It's not bad, huh Top?" Jack asked from her side.

"Yeah." Top answered. "There's a lot of life in here."

_Plant life, tiny little fish life._ Chloe repeated that motto over and over again. _No sharks, no crocodiles, no freaky rat/mole thingies. Just nice little fishies_. _Nothing to be afraid of…_

"You okay Tyler?" Jack asked his brother, who was up ahead with Strode, carrying the equipment.

"Yeah." Tyler's voice sounded odd. "I'm just thinking about Briggs."

"He can take care of himself." Charlie interjected.

"How long till we reach the cavern?" Dr. Nicolai asked from where he was right in front of Jack and Chloe, swimming next to Kathryn.

"It's a long run, Nicolai." One could _hear_ Jack's amusement. "Enjoy the ride."

Dr. Nicolai sighed.

"This has got to be one of the most beautiful caves I have ever filmed." Alex's voice was excited and amazed.

"I know." Charlie answered him. "This beats anything we saw in the Yucatan by a _mile_."

"Hey, Kim." Kathryn finally spoke. "Did you get a shot of those cave draperies?"

Charlie turned her flashlight to where Kathryn was pointing. "_Sick_, dude!"

There was a flash of light. "I got it." Alex finally replied.

"It's totally rockin'." Charlie announced.

Jack chuckled and shook his head.

Chloe turned to look at him at the sound, deciding that she liked it.

They maneuvered through the maze of ups and down, lefts and rights, and Chloe couldn't help but feel slightly panicked at the thought that she was completely lost. If their returning to Titan Hall rested on her shoulders, they would never make it back.

_Stop thinking that sort of stuff!_

They dove in silence after that until they squeezed through another opening and entered an open, dark cavern, one in which they could hardly see anything due to the black-ink darkness of the waters.

"Dr. Nicolai, you and Kathryn should check this out." Top said from the front, obviously being able to see _something_ from where he was.

The two scientists shared a look before swimming to the front lines.

"Where are we?" Chloe asked, barely missing a stalagmite that suddenly appeared to her left when she shone her light in that direction.

"We're almost there." Jack responded. "Advance base camp should be about 200 yards ahead."

"Thank _God_." Dr. Nicolai exclaimed from the front.

Chloe and Charlie giggled at the same time and turned to look at each other in amusement.

"We'll see you guys there." Kathryn announced as she, Alex and Dr. Nicolai veered from course to go see what Top had called them to look at.

Chloe shone her light in their direction as she and Jack passed them, and she gasped. "Is that--are those _bones_?"

"C'mon Chloe." Jack urged her past the _large_ skeletal remains.

Chloe didn't even know for sure if they'd taken any other turns after that, all she knew was that her mind had blanked after seeing the large remains of whatever could have been that huge and lived in these caves. She didn't understand how this didn't seem to bother anyone else—then again, maybe she was just letting her history with meteor freaks and stuff cause her imagination to run rampant. It could have been the bones of a baby _whale_ for all she knew.

"We're here."

Chloe looked at Jack and then up ahead watching as Charlie pulled herself out of the water. The blonde felt relief enter her body as she followed Jack and surfaced, pulling off her mask and breathing in air. Jack helped Chloe out of the water and soon they were on dry land, shining their flashlights around the large cave, heavy oxygen tanks on the ground at their feet.

"Wow."

Jack turned to her and grinned. "That's usually the first reaction of a first-time cave explorer."

She grinned back at him.

"Briggs?" Top called, walking around the corner of a large rock growth and disappearing from sight. "Man, where are you?"

Jack frowned in concern and turned to follow Top, motioning for Chloe to come as well. She looked around, noticing that Kathryn and the others were arriving, while Tyler and Strode were going back into the water, though she wasn't exactly sure why. The younger McAlister caught her staring at him and saluted her with a smile before diving back into the water after Strode, some wires and other things in his hands.

Shaking her head at him, Chloe forgot for a second that Jack was expecting her to follow him.

"They're going to fix the break in the wires Briggs left that caused him to lose connection with topside in the first place."

Chloe jumped in surprise, realizing that Jack had waited on her. "Oh, is it safe?"

"Course." He shook his head.

"BRIGGS!" Top could be heard yelling. "WHERE ARE YOU?"

"Let's go see to that."

Chloe nodded and followed after Jack, accepting the hand he offered as they went over the uneven ground of Kublai Khan, walking around the corner and noticing Top a few feet away, shinning his light on Brigg's gear, which looked worse for wear.

"Yo, Briggs?" Jack called, noticing that some of the equipment had been damaged.

Chloe hung back, frowning at the damaged material. What had happened here?

"_Briggs_?" Top called out.

Chloe turned and shone her light around, sure she'd heard something.

"Briggs!" Top called again, as he and Jack shone their lights in front of them, searching for their companion.

Chloe narrowed her eyes as she heard the sound of pebbles hitting water coming up from across the cavern room just a little above, and shone her light slowly upwards.

"Hey Briggs." Jack didn't sound as nervous as Top, but he sounded a little worried. "Answer me man!"

Chloe gasped when something shifted when her beam of light touched it, but when she quickly jerked her beam higher and found it shinning into the face of Briggs, who'd been hiding in one of the higher caverns with a smirk on his face, she sighed and rested on hand on her hip in irritation, lowering the beam of her flashlight so that it was illuminating his stomach.

He grinned at her as if saying, _did you REALLY expect me not to play with their heads a bit?,_ before standing. "About time you ladies got here!"

The men twirled around and shone their flashlights at him.

"You two should be ashamed of yourselves, Ms. Sullivan found me right away." He grinned. "Come take a look at this."

They climbed up the slight ledge and Briggs gave Chloe a charming grin as he gave her a hand and pulled her into the small sub-division of the cave, letting go of her hand the moment she was firmly on the high ground. Briggs turned around and walked deeper into the small little division before bending to his knees and shinning his light on something. "We're not the first ones here after all."

Chloe and the others looked over his shoulders in the small sub-division and saw the article he was pointing to.

"Looks like somebody lost his boots." Top announced from Briggs' right.

"It wasn't anyone recent." Noticing them turn to look at her, Chloe blinked. "The style is an old one, hardly used, but it's combat, probably worn by militants around the time of the Cold War."

Top was still looking at her oddly.

Jack grinned.

Briggs shook his head. "Lady, how in the world would you know the style of combat boots militants wore around the time of the Cold War?"

"Mr. Luthor's father had a fondness for the era." She wondered why Jack looked away from her at that comment and his smile died. "Let's get out of here, I'm suffocating in this darkness."

"Yeah, it stinks in here anyway." Briggs agreed, standing, forcing the others to turn and back out of the sub-division. Chloe slowly climbed back down and they made their way back to the others, who were putting up protective, water-proof tents that would protect their equipment from the water dripping from the ceiling of the cavern.

"Hey Briggs!" Charlie waved from where she was helping Alex put up one of the tents.

"Hey Charlie," he grinned back, before turning to Jack. "Did you all get a good look at those mole thingies? _Man_ are they ugly!"

Chloe left the men to talk to each other and went towards Kathryn, who'd spotted her and was grinning, motioning her over. "You seem excited."

"Chloe, this is _amazing_!" Kathryn exclaimed, pulling her over to the side. "Those were intact fossilized remains! I'm not exactly sure of _what_ they were, but I don't think I've ever studied a structure like that before. I don't want to get Lexcorp's hopes up--but we may have found the remains of a previously unknown of species of water-inhabiting dinosaur!"

"_Dinosaur_?" Chloe blinked in surprise. "That _is_ big."

"I know! We may have a huge find on our hands already—and this expedition has only begun!"

Chloe smiled, looking around and pausing when she noticed that Tyler still wasn't back. "They're taking a long time to fix the broken wire."

"I'm sure everything's all right." Kathryn waved off that worry. "Dr. Nicolai and I are trying to come up with a name for the possible new species."

"Well, knock yourself out with that, I'm--." But Chloe's words were interrupted as the cavern began to shake violently and stalactites fell from the ceiling all around them, the water beneath them bubbling up fiercely.

"Tyler!" Jack screamed, turning to the water as a smaller stalactite fell to his right and smashes to pieces, bits of it showering him painfully.

"Jesus!" Dr. Nicolai cried, being thrown to the ground by the force of the underwater eruption and the shaking of the cave.

"Strode!" Top hurried into the water and would have tried to jump into the still vicious current if Briggs hadn't grabbed him from behind, pulling his struggling form back against him. "Let go of me! Our friends are down there!"

"Not letting go of you, Top." Briggs told him in a solemn voice, tightening his hold on him.

"What the hell was that?" Charlie gasped, turning to Alex.

A body shot out from the blast and lay motionless o the top of the water, groaning.

Jack was the first at his side. "Tyler!"

"What's happening?" Tyler groaned, obviously disoriented.

Briggs let go of Top and they both hurried towards the fallen man.

"Oh my god." Chloe whispered as she and Kathryn hurried closer.

"Take it easy man." Top ordered as he and Briggs helped Jack pull Tyler away from the slowly dying geyser towards the land.

"Tyler. Tyler, wait." Jack stopped the men from moving him. "You all right?"

"Yeah. Yeah. I think so." But the force in Tyler's voice said otherwise.

"Where's Strode?" Jack asked. "Huh?"

Chloe glared at the elder McAlister. Couldn't he at least wait until Tyler was on dry land to interrogate him?

"I don't--I don't know."

"_Shit_!" Jack hurriedly went to the bank and grabbed his mask and gear. "Top, bring the J-bar."

Briggs stayed by Tyler, pulling him onto dry land before going to help the other men.

Chloe glared at them and went next to Tyler. "Are you alright?"

"He kept saying 'Help', like he was being attacked." Tyler tried to sit up but cried out in pain and laid back down immediately. "So I went back for him, but I don't know what the hell exploded." His voice was pained and his eyes closed shut.

_He might have broken a rib_. Chloe didn't notice what she was doing until she'd unzipped Tyler's wetsuit and pulled the top part off of him, reaching under the shirt he wore and running her fingers down his ribcage with practiced knowledge. When they'd realized that her Metahuman ability was to heal, Lex had done all in his power to help her learn to control her powers, and with that came basic knowledge of the human body and its functions.

She ignored the curious expression on Tyler's face as he watched her silently, but that changed when her fingers ran over a certain rib and he cried out in pain. _It's cracked._ "Sorry," she turned to look at his face and began to talk to try and distract him from her fingers, hoping that he wouldn't notice the slight burn from her flesh against his, or the fact that her fingertips were glowing. "I'm just checking you over, it's a miracle that you survived that explosion and without anything broken."

Thankfully everyone was either talking or looking at the water in expectancy, and when the cave shook again, yet this time very tame compared to the first time, it gave her the cover she needed to finish healing him without anyone even realizing what had happened.

"Jack and Top are still down there." Kathryn announced with worry as the shaking subsided.

Chloe stood and turned her back on Tyler, worried gaze on the water, never noticing when the dark haired man stood, placed one hand on his ribcage in surprise, and look at her oddly before pulling back on his wetsuit and coming to stand by her side.

She was the first to notice the men when their silhouettes darkened the water. "_Thank God_."

Jack emerged from the water, pulled off his mask, and refused to meet anyone's gaze. "Get out of your wetsuits and into your clothes. We're having a meeting in five minutes."

"What about Strode?" Briggs asked Top, going towards him.

Top looked away. "You heard the boss." And with that the dark man walked passed Briggs onto dry land.

* * *

They congregated in the driest part of the cavern, sitting around a light in deadly silence, watching Jack as he kept his back to them, looking out at the now tranquil water. Chloe sat next to a terrified-looking Dr. Nicolai and a wary Kathryn, knowing deep in her bones what Jack was going to tell them, and torn between wanting to remain in denial a little bit longer and hearing the truth.

Jack breathed out and turned to them, his eyes saying it all. "All right. Listen up." He paused for a moment before continuing. "We have a few realities to face here, people. The first is that we're not going out the way we came, the passage is completely blocked."

Dr. Nicolai covered his face with his hands and shook his head.

"The second," Jack continued, looking each and every one of them in the eye. "Is that we're not even gonna be missed for 12 days. Which is right about when our supplies run out."

Chloe closed her eyes, fighting the sense of claustrophobia that threatened to overwhelm her. _That_ was the part that she'd been screaming in her head for the last five minutes.

"We have to find out own way out."

Chloe opened her eyes and looked at Jack when he said that.

"Hold on a second, Jack." Briggs stood, glaring at the other man. "You still haven't told us what happened to Strode. Tyler said it sounded like he was being _attacked._" He stepped closer to Jack, his stance menacing. "He was _Special Forces,_ for chrissake! He knew what the hell he was doing!"

Jack stared silently at Briggs, his jaw clenched.

"Now something got him down there." Briggs continued. "And I'll bet it's the same damn thing that got whoever ownwd those boots!"

Charlie frowned. "What boots?"

She was ignored.

Jack kept his gaze on Briggs. "We're all hurting, man. Strode was a friend to all of us. Don't you forget that."

Briggs looked away and went to stand next to Top, who patted his arm.

Jack sighed and closed his eyes for a second in what seemed like a prayer, before turning to Dr. Nicolai. "What do you think, Dr. Nicolai? Is there anything that could have attacked Strode?"

"I don't know." The Russian scientist admitted, pulling his hands from his face. "The mole is the largest animal we've seen in this type of system."

"The fact that they exist at all proves that there's an abundant food supply down here." Kathryn interjected, causing everyone to look at her. "Question is, are moles at the top of the food chain, or is there something else?"

Charlie looked away, as if unable to look at Kathryn as she said that.

Chloe couldn't help herself, she quickly looked around the dark of the cavern, fearing that any minute a monster would attack. Knowing her luck, those moles were at the very bottom of the food chain--and Chloe's luck never changed, so she had a very good reason to be paranoid.

"Look," Tyler broke in. "Strode could've just screwed up his mix." He ignored the disgusted look Briggs gave him at that suggestion. "Narcosis, hallucinations. It happens. He panics and ruptures his scooter--that's the only explanation for the explosion."

"What about the wire?" Chloe asked. "You said that it looked like it'd been _chewed_."

"Those little rat-things could have done it." Tyler turned to her. "Didn't you see the dead one Kathryn found? Its teeth are huge and sharp. And also, rats are known for causing house fires because they chew through the electrical wiring."

"But there's a difference between the sizes of electrical wiring and the wires we use." Charlie finally spoke.

"Whatever it was," Top interrupted. "It doesn't matter now. Because _right now_, our primary concern is getting out of here alive."

"Amen." Alex whispered from the other side of Briggs.

Dr. Nicolai shook his head and smiled in slight disgust. "Jack, this is the Carpathians. We can spend an eternity trying to find a way out…_if_ there even _is_ one." He let them digest that before putting in his two cents. "Come on, Jack. We wait."

"_Wait_?" Chloe gasped. "Are you _joking_?"

"No, Ms. Sullivan." Dr. Nicolai turned to her. "A rescue team _will_ come for us."

"After _12_ days!" Chloe shot up to her feet, unable to believe her ears. "Supplies aside, we don't know what's _down_ here. And anyway, it'll take around two days for everyone topside to realize we're missing and get a search party organized and on site--and even if they _do_ come looking for us, they don't know _where_ we are. We're lost and trapped with our communication wire _chewed_ through!"

"Chloe's right." Jack nodded, voice even and eyes determined. "We're a mile below the surface and three miles in. The best people to get us out are all right here." He made a circle with his finger to emphasis his point. "We _are_ the rescue team, so here's how it's gonna go: Top and I, we're gonna start scouting for an exit immediately."

Briggs looked up and was about to say something when Top raised his hand to silence him, and the usually unruly man shut his mouth immediately.

"Now, I'd recommend that you all get some rest." Jack told them. "You're gonna need it." He turned to leave. "Top."

The dark man nodded and moved to go.

"Be careful man." Briggs whispered to him.

He nodded and walked passed them, following Jack.

They were silent as they watched the men leave.

"We're making a mistake." Dr. Nicolai finally broke the silence once the men were out of sight. "We should wait."

Chloe turned her back on him and rubbed her arms, trying to convince herself that the sensation she had of being watched was all in her head.

* * *

Hey everyone! Here's the second chapter, hope you enjoyed it! Review?


	3. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer: I do not own Smallville or The Cave or any characters mentioned in either. I, unfortunately, also don't own Lex Luthor (Michael Rosenbaum would be more than sufficient), Jack McAlister, OR Tyler McAlister either. Shucks. My life SUCKS man!**

_Hey everyone! Here's the third chapter to "THE CAVE", I'm enjoying writing this story so I hope that you all are enjoying reading it!_

_SPOILER FOR RUSH_

* * *

Jack and Top had been gone for a while, and just to keep themselves from going insane, those left behind finished putting up camp. Tyler was bringing the last of the oxygen tanks to where the others were resting when it happened.

Briggs turned to Tyler's back and sneered at him. "Narcosis, my _ass_." He'd been bitchy and in a mood ever since Top had left with Jack, and Chloe tensed, looking up from the mole-creature Kathryn had been examining. "That's bullshit and you know it."

Charlie closed her eyes tightly in annoyance, as if she'd known that Briggs would do something like this and the fact that she was being proven right pissed her off no small amount.

"I'm not getting into this." Tyler sighed, putting the oxygen tanks down next to the others.

"Why is _that_, Tyler?" Briggs growled, coming up behind him menacingly. "Because you forgot to stick with your dive buddy?"

Tyler tensed and then twirled around, his fist making such a strong impact with Top's face that the taller, beefier man fell from the blow. "You _asshole_!" Tyler pointed his finger angrily at the fallen man. "I had no idea--!"

Briggs turned and kicked Tyler's feet out from under him, causing the dark haired man to fall down as well. The bigger man jumped on Tyler, grabbing him by his throat.

"You guys!" Charlie shot up as Tyler grabbed Briggs by his arm, twisted it and got loose, kicking him away. "Hey! Stop it!" She got in the middle of them as both men shot up, ready to go at it again. "Hey! We just lost a friend and this is how you deal with it?" She snarled at them, causing the two larger men to wince and look away, unable to look at her. She turned to Briggs and grabbed his arm. "Come on."

Chloe noticed the torn and hurt look on Tyler's face as he walked away from them, and knew that he needed some time alone, so she turned her attention back on Kathryn, who hadn't let the fight bother her and was busy examining extracts from the dead mole and a dead salamander they'd found in the cave.

"Jack and Top have been gone for a while." The blonde rubbed her arms as a shiver ran down her spine.

"Chloe, Jack and Top are both veterans of this sort of thing, stop worrying about them." The pretty scientist announced, eye to the microscope lens. "Can you pass me the glass with the salamander extract please?"

"Sure." Chloe sighed, passing it to Kathryn and taking back the one from the mole.

"Chloe—I--I think I got something." She looked up and turned to Dr. Nicolai, who was sitting in the dark, looking up at the ceiling. "Nicolai, look at this."

Looking at them in curiosity, Nicolai stood and came towards them, giving Kathryn a look before doing as she asked and looking into the microscope. He adjusted the lens and then looked at Kathryn. "It's a parasite."

Chloe tensed, remembering all too well of the last time she'd been in a situation with parasites and caves.

_Just like the Kawatche Caves…_she looked around her, hope beginning to live within her once more. _The legend might actually be telling the truth! It could actually be here!_

"Yep. That's from the salamander." Kathryn nodded, reaching for the glass in Chloe's hand and replacing the one under the microscope with it. "And this is from the mole."

Nicolai looked through the lens once more and tensed, pulling away and looking at the two women in surprise. "It's the _same_ parasite!"

Chloe dragged her gaze from the walls of the cave around them and frowned at the scientists. She didn't know much about parasites or anything like that, but she could hear the disbelief in the man's voice and knew that there was something wrong. "What does that mean?"

She doubted that this parasite was anything like the one in the Kawatche Caves, or all of the animals would have killed themselves seeking an adrenaline rush, but this was similar, too similar, and it didn't bode well with her.

Suddenly vibrations pierced through her, and Chloe gasped, voice caught in her throat, collapsing to her knees on the harsh, rocky floor, unable to breathe as an odd sound echoed throughout her ears and the whole cave seemed to spin frantically before her eyes.

"Chloe!" She could hear Kathryn's distorted voice calling out, the first to notice what was happening.

"What's going on?" Charlie's voice was a horribly distorted bass someone to her left.

"Did something attack?" Briggs asked.

"What happened to her?" Tyler's voice was in her ear and suddenly she was being picked off the ground and held close to a warm chest as she placed her hands to her ears, trying to block out the millions of sounds of clicking and echoes.

"She's in shock." Dr. Nicolai's voice was ridiculously high to her ears, as if he'd sucked on helium.

"Tyler, bring her over here." Alex's voice was slurred, as if he was drunk. "Lay her down on this."

"No, all she needs is to calm down." Kathryn announced to her left. "She's been terrified ever since she realized that she was going to have to come down here, but she's tried to keep it hidden from all of us." Her hand touched Chloe's arm, rubbing it in a soothing manner. "The shock is getting to her with everything that's happening. She just needs to calm down."

Chloe closed her eyes tightly, not understanding how they didn't _hear_ those piercing sounds--it was like the sound a bat made to know where it was going in the dark. It was so _loud_ and it was being aimed at _her_, and something in her body, right at the back of her neck where the parasite in the Kawatche Caves had entered her, was _burning_, as if in _recognition_.

The invisible shockwaves intensified and then disappeared, and Chloe shot up in Tyler's arms, taking in a deep gulp of air, her hearing returning to normal as she greedily gulped in air and slowly relaxed to the sound of Tyler whispering in her ear and Kathryn rubbing her arm soothingly.

"That's it, you're okay." Kathryn smiled at her. "How are you feeling?"

Chloe looked around her, feeling mortified that everyone was looking at her with worry, and yet she just nodded. How had they not heard that? Was it her? Was the fear getting to her? Was she going insane? "I--I'm okay."

"You can put her down now, McAlister." Kathryn smiled gratefully at Tyler as he did so, keeping an arm around Chloe when she swayed on her feet. "Chlo, I think you should sit down for a little bit."

"No, that was more than just a panic attack." Briggs stepped forwards as Tyler helped Chloe to sit down. "_Something_ happened to her." He ignored the harsh look Kathryn sent his way. "What happened to you?"

"Back off Briggs." Tyler growled at the man, the air still tense around them.

"No, I won't!" Briggs growled back. "Am I the only one who realizes that Strode didn't get fucked up because of his own stupidity? Am I _the only one_ who has some brain-sense to know that there are weird things going on here and that in horror movies things like what just happened to her don't happen for _nothing_? That it's all linked together somehow?"

"We are not in a _movie_, Briggs!" Charlie rounded on him, exasperated. "We're in real life and Ms. Sullivan had a panic attack! And YOU are about to have one as well so you're coming up with all of these weird theories! Now leave her alone! All of you!" The petite blonde glared at all of the men. "She needs her air and some space!"

Briggs opened his mouth, as if to challenge her authority, before he shook his head, cursed, and stomped away.

Charlie and Alex walked away together, talking to each other in hushed tones, while Tyler and Kathryn plunked down on each side of Chloe and Nicolai stood in front of her.

"You okay, Ms. Sullivan?" The Russian asked. "Would you like for me to get you some water?"

She smiled weakly up at him. "No, that's okay Doc, I'm just overreacting, that's all."

"No, you've been very brave considering that you're terrified of being not only _underwater_ but trapped and in a very bad situation." Kathryn continued to rub her arm. "But we'll make it out of here, remember, Mr. Luthor only wanted the best on this expedition, so if anyone can get us out, it's Jack and his gang."

Tyler smiled at Kathryn, obviously thankful for her trust in them.

Chloe nodded, telling herself that Kathryn was right. "I--I just can't help but feel that there's something wrong." She paused, hearing an odd sound in the water. "What was that?"

"What was what?" Tyler asked, looking in the direction she was.

"_GET THE MEDICAL KIT!_" Top's voice was heard before he turned the corner, running through the water, helping an obviously injured Jack.

"_My God_…" Chloe whispered, standing up.

"JACK!" Tyler cried, getting up and racing towards Top while Kathryn and Dr. Nicolai scrambled to get the medical kit.

Briggs, Charlie and Alex turned at the screams and hurried back.

"I got him Top!" Tyler helped the dark man carrying his brother to the land. "Set him down."

"What happened?" Briggs was by Top's side in a second.

"Oh _shit_!" Tyler cursed when he saw the torn flesh. "Look at me. You all right?"

Chloe and Alex were the only ones who remained back and apart from the happenings. They stood close to each other, as if trying to draw some comfort in the other's presence.

"Top, what do you need?" Briggs asked, somewhat frantically. "Tell me."

Jack sat down with a cry of pain and threw away a large, alien looking appendix to the ground next to him.

"Jesus!" Charlie cried out when she saw the bloody thing.

"What happened, Top?" Tyler asked in agitation.

"Found that hooked in his sling." Was Top's only answer as he cast a look at the strange thing.

"Get out of my _way_ people!" Kathryn ordered in frustration, pushing the men out of her way and kneeling down beside Jack as Dr. Nicolai appeared beside her and opened the medical kit. "Jesus Jack, what the hell happened to you?"

"What the hell is _that_?" Briggs spat, looking at the severed _thing_ next to Jack.

"I cut it off," the man's voice was hoarse with pain.

"Okay, okay, everyone give him room!" Kathryn snapped, and those around reluctantly stepped back and gave her the space to work on Jack.

"Did you get a look at whatever that was attached to?" Tyler asked his brother, shinning his light on the wounds so Kathryn could see them better.

"No." Jack winced as Kathryn cleaned the wounds. "It jumped me too fast."

"Hold still." Dr. Nicolai admonished.

"Jesus, how big was it?" Charlie asked, shining her light on the _thing_.

"It's _big_." Jack answered, flinching in pain.

"Well," Alex turned to Chloe, admiringly calm given the circumstances. "At least we now know at what end of the food chain the moles are in."

"That's what I was afraid of." She whispered back to him, wincing when she realized as Dr. Nicolai began to cleanse Jack's back, that he'd been sliced there as well.

"How's it looking, Doc?" Jack asked the Russian.

"Whatever it was that you encountered, Jack, it ripped you up pretty badly." Dr. Nicolai sighed. "You need an antibiotic. Kathryn, hand me a syringe."

"A little busy here…" Kathryn announced, wrapping up Jack's cleansed leg.

"Here you go, doc." Charlie passed Dr. Nicolai the syringe after going through the kit.

Chloe looked away when Jack cried out as Dr. Nicolai injected him in the torn flesh of his back. She wished that she could just go there and heal him herself, but it was too risky, she couldn't expose herself and her powers, not in this situation--not with these jumpy people. With Tyler it'd been easy because it was a minor injury and no one had been paying attention at the time, but everyone's attention was on Jack. She couldn't heal him of his wounds without glowing, and even if his wounds suddenly disappearing wouldn't have caught anyone's attention, her lighting up like the fourth of July _would_, and that would lead to too many questions--and from healing those injuries she'd probably need a couple hours of sleep to recuperate.

They didn't have time for that. They were now at the bottom of the food chain and needed to find a way _out_.

Maybe, maybe she could subtly heal Jack little by little? All it would take would be several discreet touches whenever others weren't watching. It would take longer, but he'd still be getting healed…

"Let's go look at this Motha." Briggs announced when Jack was fully bandaged and taken care of, picking up what Chloe knew to be a _finger fully equipped with a large claw_.

"I'll go get the camera." Alex told Chloe. "We'll need to have this documented."

* * *

Chloe looked back at Jack, who sat apart from the others, they crowded the table where Kathryn was examining the severed finger/claw. While he didn't seem to be in much pain, Jack was pale, and it worried Chloe, but she was more worried about what this finger could be attached to, so she turned her attention to Kathryn when she finally spoke.

"There's a resemblance to amphibian tissue." She looked up from the severed remain with a frown. "But these hair follicles would seem to rule that out."

Dr. Nicolai nodded his agreement.

"The only thing I _do_ know is that this is _definitely_ a predator." She looked at them all in silence.

"Great." Briggs sneered. "So now we're part of the food chain."

"We always have been." Kathryn shot back, returning her attention to the thing on the table. "We've just forgotten that, living in cities." She pressed down on a specific part of the thing with her tool and it twitched violently, as if trying to dig its claw into her.

Kathryn pulled back and gasped, as did most of those around the table.

"Just reflexes." Dr. Nicolai reassured everyone. "Don't worry."

Charlie pinched the bridge of her nose and closed her eyes, obviously trying to calm herself.

"So," Alex continued filming the remains. "What is it?"

"Well, without DNA testing it would be impossible to tell." Kathryn looked up into the camera.

Dr. Nicolai once more nodded his agreement as the camera lens shot to him. "This may be something we've never seen before."

"Every cave organism we've discovered so far originated on the surface." Kathryn continued, ignoring the camera to concentrate on her dissection of the thing. "Over time, they've adapted, lost pigmentation and sight, and developed a heightened sense of hearing and smell." She paused, standing straight and staring down at her dissection. "If this _is_ a totally self-contained ecosystem--."

"Yes," Dr. Nicolai interrupted. "We may have discovered the primeval creature that has evolved in total isolation."

"Well, it looks like a piece from those things on the pictures Ms. Sullivan showed me of the mosaics found in the early part of the dig."

Tyler frowned. "What mosaics?"

"The ones with the demons." Jack announced darkly from behind them.

"_Demons_?" Charlie squeaked.

"There are no such things as demons." Dr. Nicolai was quick to assure her. "The old friars probably knew of these creatures, that'd evolved unlike anything they'd seen before, and immediately their superstitious minds thought up demons from hell, which would be fitting considering that this is a cave. They probably thought this was a portal from hell, which would explain why they'd seal it off and build a church over it."

"What would keep them from just destroying the seal and coming up through the church?" Tyler asked.

"In legend nothing demonic can touch holy ground." Chloe whispered, not really listening to what she was saying. She was thinking about something Kathryn had said, something that just wouldn't leave her alone. "Kathryn, you said that these things most probably lost their ability to see, and because of that they developed other heightened senses."

"Yes, I did." Kathryn nodded with a curious frown. "Why?"

Chloe finally met her gaze. "Do you think--could they use echo-location to find prey--like bats do?"

Kathryn blinked and shared a look with Dr. Nicolai. "Yes, they—they could very well have developed that sort of ability, now that you say it, it would make the most sense, these creatures probably _do_ use echo-location."

"Dear God." Dr. Nicolai gasped, bringing his hand to his heart.

"They're friggin' mutant _bats_!" Briggs snapped.

Chloe didn't hear any of this, her eyes widened as she remembered feeling the vibrations, hearing the clicking sounds…what if she hadn't been crazy? What if it hadn't been a panic attack? What if what she'd heard, what she'd felt, had been one of these creatures scanning them and their camp?

_But why would only __**I**__ be able to hear and feel it?_

"Look." Kathryn's voice brought Chloe out of her troubling thoughts.

"What?" Dr. Nicolai asked, bending down to be able to see better what she was pointing at.

"There."

Charlie bent as well and pulled some hair from her gaze, eyes widening. "It's still alive?"

"Those tendrils look familiar?" Kathryn asked, ignoring Charlie's question.

"Yeah." Dr. Nicolai nodded. "The parasite."

Chloe took a step backwards as it smashed into her. Those creatures were infected with the parasite--and if that parasite was anyhow related to the one _she'd_ been infected with once years ago, maybe that was _why_ she'd sensed what the others hadn't! Maybe, despite the fact that the parasite had been taken out of her, something had remained, maybe _that_ was why the back of her neck had throbbed so violently hot when she'd felt it, and that was why the sound waves had intensified on her.

_Dammit_!

She'd been living all these years with a trace of the parasite _still inside of her!_

No one seemed to notice her silent meltdown, only having eyes for Kathryn and the thing.

She nearly screamed when something came down hard on her shoulder, and she turned to see Jack standing next to her, eyeing the remains with distaste. "All right, let's pack it up." Everyone turned to look at him in surprise. "It's time to go." He squeezed her shoulder and then walked away towards the equipment. "We take only what we need, but we're taking our dive gear."

Tyler nodded and headed after Jack, Top following slowly behind.

Charlie and Briggs remained behind, watching as Kathryn grabbed the remains carefully and put them into a Ziploc bag.

A muscle in Dr. Nicolai's cheek jerked as he looked at the table. "We should _wait here_."

"Wow, that's just brilliant, doc." Briggs snorted in disgust, arms folded over his chest. "You really want to be sitting here on your ass when the lights go out?" Shaking his head in disgust, he and Charlie followed after their leader.

* * *

They began their trek through the cave system, Jack this time assuming his position in the front with Top following behind and making sure that nothing crept up on them. Chloe found herself right behind Jack, feeling safer with him than with the other men despite the fact that Jack was injured. She tensed when she felt the vibrations race through her again, yet this time it didn't send her into an attack, but it caused the hair on the back of her neck to stand. And from the way Jack tensed at the same time she did, the blonde couldn't help but wonder if he could feel it too.

Alex, god bless his soul, was keeping himself occupied and calm in the only way he knew--he was busying himself by _filming_ the expedition.

"Hey," Charlie finally broke the silence sometime later into the long, grueling walk. "Maybe there's a way to climb out."

"Yeah," Briggs agreed from where he and Tyler were carrying a stretched with the important things they hadn't been able to leave behind at advance camp. "Better up than down."

The clicking sound seemed to echo all around them in the cavern. Something was trailing them.

"What's that?" Charlie's voice pierced the silence as her beam of light rested over something to the side. "Are those more bones?"

Dr. Nicolai went to the remains and picked it up, the light of his flashlight showing the cuts sliced the bones. "Looks like we found the owner of those boots everyone's been talking about." He turned his head to look at Kathryn as everyone gathered around him. "Teeth marks."

The silence that followed was _deafening_.

Jack broke it, shinning his light in the direction they'd been heading. "Let's go."

No one argued with him, glad to be moving away from the reminder that there was something dangerous in the caves with them--although Alex made sure to film the bones quickly before catching up with the rest of them, unwilling to remain behind alone.

They continued walking in silence, eyes vigilant on the caverns around them, as they followed Jack without question. Chloe'd stopped feeling the vibrations or hearing the sonar clicks a while back, and didn't know whether to be thankful that the creature had decided that they weren't interesting enough to follow, or afraid that it'd been a scout and gone back to tell the rest of its species that there was fresh meat.

_Stop thinking like that, stop thinking like that!_

"We have to go through here." Jack's voice brought her out of her thoughts, and she gasped when she realized what he was talking about. Their path was blocked by a large wall and the only way to get to the other side for them to be able to continue on their expedition to find a way out was by crawling through a tight, narrow, and apparently long hole through the wall.

"No. No _way_!" Chloe shook her head. They'd be sitting ducks if they went through that! What was to say that they wouldn't get trapped in there or that the creatures weren't waiting on the other side to kill them off one by one as they came out?

No.

_No!_

She'd faced enough fears as it was, and she wasn't up to facing yet _another_ closed dark space. She was staying right--hey, wait, what was Jack doing? "Let go of me!" She struggled to free her arm from his grip as he pulled her after him towards the dark crevice. "I'm not doing it! Let _go_!"

"Chloe, look at me, _look at me_!"

She pushed down the hysteria and looked him deep in his eyes.

"Remember what I told you to do if you panicked while we were diving?" Jack asked, his hands on her shoulders. "I need you to apply that to this situation. I need you to trust me."

"But--but--." Her gaze left his and went to the dark crevice.

"No, _look at __**me**_**.**" Jack shook her hard enough to cause her to look at him once more. "I'm not going to let anything happen to you, Chloe, to _any of you_. But I need you to _trust me_."

She hated it, hated the fact that she was breaking down in front of everyone, but she couldn't keep the tears back as they fell silently down her cheeks.

"Maybe we should take 5 and give her a moment to calm down." Tyler spoke.

"No." Jack didn't take his eyes from Chloe's, his fingers on her shoulders caressing her softly in a soothing manner. "She's strong. She can do this."

And those words were what did it. Chloe closed her eyes and took in a deep breath, forcing herself to calm down before shaking her head. "I'm fine." She knew they all knew it was a lie, but it was a lie she needed to believe. "I'm fine."

"Good girl." Jack smiled slightly at her before letting go of his hold on her shoulders and turning to everyone. "We go through _now_. I'll lead, Top will follow, then Chloe, Kathryn, Charlie, Dr. Nicolai and Alex will go through, and Tyler and Briggs will come last."

Everyone nodded, although Briggs looked around him in the dark and gulped.

Chloe took in another deep breath as Jack and Top took off their backpacks, Jack pushing his in the crevice in front of him before climbing in, crawling on his belly and disappearing into the darkness. Top waited a minute before doing the same.

"Come on, Chlo." Kathryn smiled weakly at her side. "It's our turn."

--

Chloe had never been more relieved than when she finally made it out of the crevice and Jack pulled her out. She was about to thank him when he turned and walked away, heading turning the corner and disappearing from sight. The blonde frowned and looked at Top for an answer, as he helped Kathryn out of the crevice and onto her feet, but the handsome dark man only shook his head to signal that he didn't understand what Jack was up to.

"Where did Jack go?" Kathryn asked, pulling back on her backpack and following Top and Chloe as they hurried in the direction Jack had gone, leaving the rest to do the same once they made it out of the crevice.

Turning the corner they came upon a fork in the road, two different tunnels leading in two different directions, and Jack was no where to be seen.

"What do we do?" Chloe whispered, desperately reminding herself that Jack had asked her to trust him.

"We wait." Top sighed, pulling off his backpack and sitting on a rock. "He's scouting the tunnels, we wait here until he returns."

"Don't you have sonar guns for this kind of situation?" Kathryn asked, worry etched in her features. "He shouldn't have gone ahead alone, not injured, not with whatever is out there."

"I've learnt to always trust Jack's instincts without a question." Top announced slowly. "He has never failed us once, and I doubt he'll start to now."

"Why are you sitting down, Top?" Briggs asked as he, Tyler, and the others finally appeared, flashing their flashlights around. "Why are we taking a break?"

Top remained silent.

"Talk about a fork in the road." Tyler announced, shinning his light into the darkness of both tunnel, the darkness so black it swallowed the bright light whole.

"A fork or a dead end?" Charlie whispered, joining her light with Tyler's and _still_ they were unable to see anything except the darkness within.

Briggs sat down, his gaze going from Top to Tyler and back. "Where's Jack?"

"Scouting the tunnel." Top finally spoke.

"So why aren't we helping him?" Briggs wanted to know.

"You know the drill, Briggs." Top sounded tired and annoyed. "Give him a chance to read the sediment."

"Yeah, I know the drill, Top." Briggs replied, reaching into his discarded backpack and pulling out something that resembled a gun as he stood. "You don't have to tell me about drills. Sonar gun's right here." He went to aim it at one of the tunnels when Top's hand reached out and quickly pushed it down, stopping him.

"Relax." Top ordered, hand still on Briggs', keeping the sonar gun pointed to the ground.

Sensing motion, Chloe looked up and noticed Jack as he emerged from the darkness of one of the caves. She frowned, looking at him, sensing something different yet not understanding _what_ it was. There was something different in the way he walked, something--something was _different_.

"What the hell's going on?" Jack asked, going towards Briggs and Top.

"Come on, Jack." Briggs spoke, as if knowing that pissing Jack off wasn't the best thing to do right now. "I just wanna get the hell out of here."

Jack gave him a smile that was chilling. "Well maybe you out to follow me, Briggs."

Kathryn and Dr. Nicolai shared concerned looks.

Tyler frowned slightly.

Jack's smile disappeared and he grabbed his discarded backpack, going towards the tunnel he'd just emerged from, the darkness swallowing him whole.

Chloe went to follow him but stopped when Tyler's hand came down on her shoulder. "What?" She asked, as everyone marched in after Jack, everyone, that is, except Dr. Nicolai, Briggs, Tyler and herself. The young woman frowned, not liking the fact that they were suddenly two groups.

Tyler's eyes were narrowed on Briggs, who still held the sonar gun in his hand rebelliously.

"This is _bullshit_." Briggs announced, aiming the gun at the tunnel Jack and the others had just disappeared into--watching the readings--and then aimed the gun at the other tunnel, doing the same thing. "Jack didn't pick the dominant artery."

"Are you sure?" Dr. Nicolai asked, going behind the other man to be able to read the reading.

"Yeah," Briggs nodded. "I'm sure. This is the one right here. Take a look at it." He stepped forwards and activated the sonar gun once again into the tunnel he said Jack should have taken them in, looking down at the reading and suddenly going pale. "There's something in there that wasn't there before."

Chloe took a step back.

Tyler left her and went to Briggs, looking over his shoulder at the reading before looking at the darkness of what would be the dominant artery, as if trying to see what the sonar gun had picked up. "Well, why don't you go scout it out for us, Briggs?"

Chloe narrowed her eyes at Tyler for that comment. This was _not_ the time for those two to be getting at it!

But Briggs didn't rise to the bait, for once, his trembling gaze focused on the darkness of the tunnel in question. "Forget about it." He quickly turned around and put the sonar gun away, heading rapidly towards the tunnel that Jack and the others had disappeared into minutes ago.

Dr. Nicolai followed.

"Tyler?" Chloe asked in a soft voice when only the two of them were left at the fork in the road, Tyler still looking into the darkness of the other cave. "We should get going." She hugged herself and looked around her nervously. "It's not safe to be so far away from the group like this. We could get targeted."

He turned at her voice and nodded, motioning for her to follow him as he entered the tunnel everyone else had, and Chloe followed quickly behind, afraid and knowing it showed. They quickly found the others after the tunnel opened up, proving that there was yet another wall blocking their way. Charlie, Jack and Top were working rapidly to get the climbing equipment so they could climb up.

Charlie was higher up above Jack and Top installing the equipment, which didn't surprise Chloe because she'd been told that Charlie was the best climber of the team, so it would make sense that she was in charge of this. "On belay." The young woman called down to Top and Jack. "You're safe to climb."

Alex was busy filming, while Dr. Nicolai, Kathryn and Briggs spoke in hushed tones. Tyler went to join them, but Chloe didn't follow, she circled closer to where Jack and Top were, catching the later part of their conversation.

"You gonna let me change that bandage when we get to the top?" Top asked, watching as Jack wiggled his injured hand as if to try and wiggle the pain away, the bandage red with his blood.

Chloe frowned. She was going to have to start with the mini healing sessions soon.

"I'm all right." Jack shook his head.

"Looks like it's getting infected." Top insisted. "You sure?"

"I'm so tired." Dr. Nicolai could be heard complaining as he sat down. "We need a break."

"Not with that thing out there!" Briggs scoffed.

"We gotta let them rest, Jack." Top sighed.

Jack was silent for a moment, looking up the expanse of what they had to climb and then at his right hand man. "Once we hit the water."

"Water?" Top asked, frowning. "I don't hear any water."

"Yeah." Jack agreed. "I smell it."

Top was silent, yet the look he sent his leader was a worried one.

Jack looked past Top at Chloe, as if he'd known she was there listening to them all along. "Come on, we need to strap you up."

"I've never done this before." She didn't pretend to be ashamed for having listened to his conversation.

"Life is full of firsts." Was Jack's answer. He didn't say anything else as he helped her get strapped up and it was a surprisingly easy climb. Chloe had to admit that if this hadn't been a life-threatening experience she might have actually learned to _enjoy_ rock-climbing, though Dr. Nicolai didn't seem to share that sentiment, he huffed and complained and took the longest to make the climb.

Soon they were walking once more, and Chloe didn't know why she wasn't surprised to find that the dry land gave way to a cavern of water only a couple of hundred feet away. She sent a look in Jack's direction, noticing that Top was doing the same.

Jack, however, ignored the others as he knelt by the edge, lit a flare, and threw it into the water, the flare lighting the way down and giving them an idea of the terrain below water.

Alex appeared next to Jack, filming everything.

The light shone on Jack's face as he tried to watch the trajectory of the flare, and he winced, a muscle in his cheek jumping as he turned to Alex in annoyance. "Not now." He softly but determinedly pushed the camera and it's light off of his face.

"We're gonna need footage like this." Alex answered, continuing to film.

Chloe felt the electric charge in the air before something seemed to _snap_ in Jack and he shot to his feet, grabbed the camera and threw it viciously into the water.

"What the _hell_ do you think you're doing?" Alex growled, pushing Jack. "That camera was paying for this expedition!"

Jack's eyes seemed to darken and he charged forth at Alex, but Chloe got in the middle of them and did the only thing she could think about to try and calm him, she _hugged_ him, using the distraction to also insert some of her healing powers into him. Jack froze beneath her touch as something _electric_ jolted through them, much like her reaction to the feel of the creature's sonar calls bouncing off of her, and yet somewhat different.

The old scar at the back of her neck throbbed once more and she realized that as she was hugging him her hand was unfortunately on the bandaged wounds on his back--and they were throbbing to the same beat as the tiny scar on the back of her neck.

Chloe's eyes widened from where she was pressing her face into his wetsuit, suddenly realizing what was different about Jack.

Jack finally pulled away and looked intensely in her eyes, as if trying to find something, before he shook his head and turned to look at Alex. "I'm sorry, man." He sighed, looking truly contrite. "I was out of line."

The Asian sighed as well, all anger gone from his face. "That's okay man. We're all edgy, it's understandable."

Jack nodded and turned to look at the water, as if trying to avoid Chloe, and suddenly he paused, watching the light of the camera as it continued to sink into the depth of the water. "There's a current." He turned to look at Top and Tyler. "Grab some food. You two keep an eye out. We'll rest for 20." Jack turned and began walking away from the group before pausing and turning to Chloe expectantly.

Realizing that he wanted her to follow, Chloe shared a look with a worried Top before hurrying and falling into step with Jack, not questioning why he was separating them from the others, going to the farthest corner of the cavern, making sure that no one could hear what they had to say, and in the darkness, it would be hard for the others to see them as well.

She knew what he was going to say, knew because he'd sensed it in her like she'd sensed it in him.

Jack paused, sitting down on a rock, looking down at his feet. "When were you infected?"

Chloe didn't answer him at once, she kept her eyes on the open crevice above her, not liking the fact that something could be hiding up there in the darkness and they would never even know it unless it tried to scan them. "When I was fourteen."

"Huh?" Jack jerked his gaze up from the floor to her. "What are you talking about?"

"I don't think it's the same parasite, but I'm almost completely sure that it's from the same family." She finally turned to look at him. "It made me do some stupid things, but didn't give me any enhanced senses." She smiled tiredly at the confused look he gave her. "You _smell_ water frequently then?"

He frowned, as if suddenly realizing what he'd said to Top, and what it'd meant.

She knelt down in front of him, hands on his thighs, looking in his eyes. "I didn't know the 'demons' were actually a super evolved species of animal. I didn't know anything of this would happen."

"I know." His smile was chilly. "You were terrified at just the thought of _swimming_ in the water, you wouldn't have come down here if you'd known the truth." Jack suddenly groaned in pain and closed his eyes tightly, his whole body shaking.

"Jack?" She whispered.

"_Don't…draw…attention_…" His voice was a hiss of pain as he hunched over and brought his bandaged hands closed in fists to his face. His whole body shook violently and Chloe slipped between his thighs, hugging him once again, closing her eyes tightly as he hugged her back so strongly it _hurt_.

His skin seemed to _ripple_ under his shirt, and he muted the cry of pain by burying his face in her hair, pressing his closed mouth painfully against her head.

Chloe didn't understand what was happening, but she dug her fingers into his back and activated her healing powers, and while the wounds beneath her hands began to heal, it opened up another channel that caused her to bite down on her lip to keep from screaming out in pain as what he was experiencing transitioned into her.

The world seemed to be shaking, inside her body burnt, and colors blurred before her eyes as sounds distorted.

Then, as suddenly as it'd started, it'd stopped, and Chloe threw herself away from Jack, the glow in her hands fading immediately. They stared at each other with wide eyes, both frightened, both breathing in deeply.

"What the hell was that?" She hissed from where she was sprawled on the ground, her hip paining her from where she'd fallen on some rocks when she'd pushed away. "What happened?"

"I—I don't--." Jack suddenly paused, eyes widening, tilting his head slightly to the right. His eyes narrowed suddenly as he tilted his head to the left, as if he was _listening_ to something, something Chloe just couldn't hear. "I can hear them talking."

"Who?" Chloe asked, eyeing the two groups sitting way on the other side of the cavern.

Jack forced his gaze to meet hers. "Everyone."

* * *

The next minutes passed rapidly as Chloe and Jack sat with their backs against the wall as the blonde told him about Smallville, about the Kawatche Caves, and about her own parasite. She'd told him how the one she'd been infected with had fed off of the adrenaline gland, and that even though she couldn't remember what she'd done while under the control of the parasite, she'd been told that she'd done some pretty crazy and dangerous things. Then, she'd confessed her worry that maybe a piece of the parasite had been left within her, and told him why.

Jack sat in silence, elbows resting on his knees, looking at his hands. "It's definitely not the same parasite, but I think you might be right--it might be a part of the same family." He paused. "I can sense you, Chloe. I don't know how, maybe it's the parasites within us recognizing each other, I don't know, but I can sense you." He turned to look at her, expression bleak. "And I'm wondering if I'm not the only one who can."

Chloe went pale at the insinuation, and would have said something but she noticed Jack tense up, and that was when she noticed Tyler making his way towards them.

"Hey bro," the dark haired McAlister bent facing them, looking honestly worried about his brother. "How you doing?"

Jack turned to look at Tyler in silence.

"Jack," Tyler began, eyes searching his brother's face. "I'm worried about you."

"I'm going to leave you two alone so you can--." Chloe started to get up but stopped when Jack's hand came down on her arm. What was it with these brothers and telling her when she could move?

"Stay." Jack told her, pushing down slightly on her arm.

Tyler frowned as he looked from Jack to Chloe.

She sighed and sat back down, looking at her feet.

"Jack," Tyler tried again. "Is there something wro--?"

"Briggs is gonna be a problem." Jack interrupted, eyes on the darkness surrounding his feet. "You know that, don't you?"

Tyler tensed, but that was because he didn't know what Chloe did, didn't knew what Jack's newly sensitive hearing had let him overhear. His dark gaze went where Briggs was before he returned it to Jack and nodded, obviously knowing Briggs enough to know that no matter what the situation, Briggs would be a problem.

"I can't save them, Tyler, not if no one trusts me."

Chloe winced, wondering what other conversations he'd over heard. "That's not true Jack," she placed her hand on his arm. "_I_ trust you." He didn't look up from the floor of the cavern, but his arm tensed under her touch. "You've been asking me to do that since _before_ we started out on this expedition." She squeezed his arm slightly. "You've kept me safe this far, and I trust you completely, I _know_ you'll get us out of here safely."

He snorted softly, finally turning to look at her. "At the moment, you're the only one who _does_."

Chloe frowned in worry and looked up at Tyler.

"No she isn't." Tyler said, causing Jack to turn to look at him. "Top and I have never doubted you, and we're not about to do so now." He paused. "Although Top is worried about your injuries. You should let him look at them and cleanse them, he's worried about gangrene setting in."

"I'm fine." Jack looked away, but the relief was obvious in his expression. "Chloe's been checking on them for me."

Chloe's eyes widened. Had he realized that she was healing him? But _how_? She hadn't told him about her being a meteor freak _or_ about her healing abilities!

"Tell them that it's time to get into the water." Jack said softly. "They'll listen to you."

Tyler seemed sad and torn, but he shook it off and stood. "Yes sir." Giving Chloe a look that promised that he was going to talk to her alone later to figure out what was going on with his brother, Tyler marched off.

Chloe watched him leave but turned back to Jack when she saw him close his eyes tightly and reach for her hand, squeezing it tightly as his body shook once more, yet not as violently as it had the last time. She didn't dare open up the channel between them again by trying to heal him while he was going through these weird and unexplainable attacks.

And just like last time, as suddenly as the attack began it ended, and Jack relaxed, opening his eyes and taking in a deep breath. "Let's do this."

* * *

Hey y'all! Hope you liked the update! Drop a review so I can know you're reading and enjoying!


	4. Chapter 4

**Disclaimer: I do not own Smallville or The Cave or any characters mentioned in either. I, unfortunately, also don't own Lex Luthor (Michael Rosenbaum would be more than sufficient), Jack McAlister, OR Tyler McAlister either. Shucks. My life SUCKS man!**

_Hey y'all! I'm back with the fourth chapter to "The Cave", and excited because people seem to be liking how I'm going with the mixing of events in the movie and series. I have to admit that I feel giddy writing this series, because I'm already imaging the sequel and trying to work that out and tie in things, and all the while I'm trying not to forget anything I had planned to do with THIS the first in the series, you know? Also, I'd like to point out that since this is a crossover, certain things obviously don't happen like in the movie, so, that was a warning._

_Oh well, I'm talking and talking again, and all you people want t do is read the chapter--so I won't keep you all any longer._

_ENJOY!_

* * *

As soon as they hit the water, any differences in opinion the others might have had about Jack or his leadership were pushed aside as they once more aligned themselves to follow his lead.

"Let's not get too spread out." Jack spoke into the microphone in his mask.

Before they'd set off he'd helped Chloe into her diving gear and told her that the rules remained the same, she didn't know much about diving and she had even more reason to panic now, so they were going to stick together, swimming side by side, and she was just going to have to trust him.

Chloe _did_ trust Jack, but she still kept her eyes open as they began their underwater journey. Unlike their last dive, Chloe wasn't able to admire the beautiful underwater life, at every little shifting of shadows she'd look around, expecting to be attacked by some ferocious underwater version of whatever it was that'd attacked Jack.

The underwater cavern grew narrower and narrower until they were diving with the cavern's roof almost touching their gear and the cavern's bottom almost scraping their wetsuits. At one point Chloe felt close to panicking, but she'd repressed it, feeling like a coward. Everyone else on this expedition were just as terrified as she was, and yet she was the only one who'd been having a public breakdown.

And that was not the image she wanted to convey of Lexcorp, of _Lex_. She closed her eyes and tried to imagine how things would be if Lex had come with her on this expedition, and she hated to admit it, but Lex would have remained stoic in the face of even an _attack_, and he would have protected her at all costs, just like Jack was doing.

_I miss Lex…_

Something caught her attention out of the corner of her eye, sticking out from the pebbles at the bottom of the cavern. The blonde looked at Jack, noticed his attention elsewhere, and swam towards the green rock. Removing the pebbles from around it, Chloe tugged on the tightly embedded rock and grunted when it finally came free.

_Kryptonite_.

She blinked in surprise, unable to believe that her eyes weren't playing tricks on her. There was _green kryptonite_ in a completely isolated and self-sustained ecosystem in a cave in _Romania_. It was all so _unbelievable_ that she didn't notice that the others were leaving without her until Jack's voice resounded in her mask.

"Chloe, what are you doing?" He sounded irritated. "Get over here! Don't separate from the group!"

Looking up in the direction of the swimmers, Chloe realized that they were a good ways ahead of her, and that they'd stopped the procession to wait for her. "Sorry, I got distracted." Closing her fist over the meteor rock, Chloe quickly swam back to the group and rejoined Jack up front.

The rest of the dive she kept rubbing her thumb over the Green K, wondering how it'd gotten there and if the creatures that inhabited this cave-system had been mutated _because_ of overexposure to the meteor rock. She then thought of this cave and of the Kawatche Caves, wondering about the parasites, and if they didn't live within the green kryptonite and evolved for the need at hand.

The Kawatche Caves hid the secret room, so it made sense that the parasites that protected it would infect those who entered and make them rapidly end their own lives by seeking the ultimate 'rush'. That way no one would really _care_ about the caves, they'd be all over the place riding in fast cars, jumping off of buildings--.

But the parasite in _this_ cave acted differently, so obviously it'd been created for a different purpose, it didn't target the adrenaline gland of its host. But _what_ did it _do_? If what Chloe was looking for was really there, how was this parasite fulfilling its duty by protecting it?

"The current's pushing us up." Jack's voice broke into her thoughts.

"Yeah." Briggs could be heard agreeing. "I feel it."

They made their way out of the cavern and Chloe nearly sighed in relief when she saw the surface above.

"Looks like it's pretty choppy up there." Tyler commented from the back of the group.

They surfaced one by one and remained in a circle, the water choppy like Tyler had commented on. There were little waterfalls behind them, so the sound of falling and running water was loud, and Jack had to talk above the noise to be heard.

"All right, listen up." He spoke loudly and yet the sound of the water still drowned out some of the words. "Secure all your gear."

"Jack," Kathryn called back, realizing his intent to ride down the rapids for a speedier travel. "We don't know where the rapids go!"

"What do you want to do?" Top asked in annoyance, pulling off his tank and securing his gear as Jack had ordered. "_Go back?_"

"She's right, Jack." Briggs instead took Kathryn's side. "We should find another way."

"This _is_ the goddamn way!" Jack snapped, his patience obviously reaching its limit with their expecting him to lead but questioning his every decision at every step of the way.

Kathryn looked away.

Alex looked at Jack in worry.

"I'll go first." Top announced, proving his trust in Jack.

"Yeah," Jack nodded, thankful. "Get going."

Hugging his oxygen tank and gear to his chest, using it as a flotation device, Top allowed the strong current to take him away, and everyone watched him going, Kathryn in concern and Briggs with a conflicted expression on his face.

"I'm not doing this." Dr. Nicolai finally spoke. "This is _insane_!"

"This is the only way." Alex surprised everyone by saying. "We have to follow Jack, and he says that this is the way we have to go."

"Don't you see how _dangerous_ these rapids become?" The Russian turned to the Asian. "We could all break our necks!"

"Jack and Tyler can help you." Chloe winced when everyone turned to look at her. "Dr. Nicolai, they're the best of the best, and with their help you should be able to make it out okay."

The Russian paused, considering what she was saying.

Jack shook his head. "No, I have to help _you_--."

"No, you _don't have to."_ Chloe argued back. "_Briggs_ can help me, he's just as good a diver."

Briggs preened at that, despite the situation.

Jack frowned. "I don't like the idea of--."

"_Jack_." She glared at him. "We don't have _time_ to argue about this!"

"She's right." Tyler interjected, earning him a thankful smile from her. "Arrogant-bastard attitude aside, Briggs is more than decent at what he does. They'll be okay."

"Yeah Jack." Briggs added, obviously forgetting that he'd been against this idea from the start. "I'll take good care of her."

Jack frowned, obviously not liking the idea, but realizing that time was of the essence and Chloe wasn't about to budge. "Okay then, you all win. Dr. Nicolai, you're coming with Tyler and me. Charlie, you take Kim, Kathryn knows how to dive, she'll be alright."

Kathryn nodded her agreement.

The Russian smiled, looking much more at ease now as he and Tyler made their way to Jack.

Charlie grabbed hold of Alex and they both took in deep breaths before letting the strong current take them away.

Tyler turned to the obviously frightened Russian. "Dr. Nicolai, I need you to put on your goggles and hold onto me."

The elder man nodded stiffly.

Jack gave Chloe one last look before joining them and they disappeared down the vicious current.

"Jack has a death wish." Kathryn whispered to herself as the three remaining inched closer and closer towards the strong current that tried to pull them away with every inch they swam.

"We have to trust him." Chloe frowned to her friend. "He's going to get us out."

"Or he'll end up getting us _killed_." Briggs mumbled under his breath. "_Whoa_, a couple of more paddles and we'll be caught in the current. Ms. Sullivan, I think it's time you gave me a nice big hug."

Kathryn, who was behind the two, rolled her eyes at the comment. "Dear _God_."

Chloe glared at him as she stopped swimming, refusing to 'hug' him until the last moment, but she knew that this was a dangerous ride, and she _had_ forced Jack to let Briggs help her through the rapids, so she was just going to have suck it up and--suddenly the small scar at the back of her neck began to throb.

_Oh no, dear Go--_! She screamed as something grabbed onto her fin.

"What's wrong?" Briggs asked, turning around to look at her and then crying out as he was pulled into the strong current.

"There's something in the water!" Chloe cried as she struggled with whatever had grabbed a hold of her fin, trying to yank her under, but Kathryn grabbed her hand and held onto a boulder they were passing by, managing to keep the blonde's head above the water.

In the commotion Chloe didn't have time to notice Briggs' horrified face or the fact that he allowed himself to be pulled into the stronger current and away from whatever had her in the water.

"Try kicking at it!" Kathryn ordered, voice strained as she did her best to keep Chloe above water despite the strong thing trying to pull her down. "You have to get it to let go of you!"

The scar in the back of Chloe's neck throbbed like the beat of drums in a samba, and she screamed as she felt something curling up along her legs, curling up her thighs. In the back of her mind she registered pain, but her terror was truly the only emotion she felt as the thing gave her an extra hard tug, causing her head to momentarily go under water, but in seconds Kathryn had pulled her back up.

Chloe reached for Kathryn, trying to help her keep her above water, and feeling stupid because during all of this she still had not gotten rid of the meteor rock in her hand.

She screamed as she felt the creature sink it's teeth into her thigh, but her scream was muted when it gave an extra hard tug and pulled her free from Kathryn's hold, pulling her under the water and out of the reach of her rescuer. Chloe tried to kick it yet was unable to, it was also impossible to get a good look at it, whatever it was, but she knew that it had an inhuman form, a form like something she'd never seen before, and it had her thigh in its mouth.

Boosted by pure adrenaline and fear, Chloe tightened her hold on the meteor rock in her hand and brought it down as hard as she could on what she expected to be the head of the creature. She did so over and over again, the creature shaking her violently, and dark red blood--not just her own seeping the water dark. She brought the meteor rock down once more as hard as she could, and felt something shift beneath her as the creature screamed, its mouth opening and she was able to escape, rising to the surface and gasping in a greedy gulp of air, surprised to see a horrified Kathryn still there.

"Wh—what happened?" Kathryn seemed to have gone into shock. "How did you--?"

"No time to explain!" Chloe grabbed onto her friend and winced as she swam into the strong current, her thigh throbbing in pain, yet the bite marks were burning her terribly--a sure sign that her body was already furiously working to heal her.

They entered the vicious current and were swept away immediately into the rapids, where there was no ups or downs or left or right, everything was mixed up together and in such a quick rush Chloe couldn't help but be smashed into a couple of boulders she couldn't avoid, crying out in pain, feeling her body burning hotter as it continued to heal the damages she was inflicting on herself.

"Ms. Sullivan!" She thought she heard Dr Nicolai screaming over the sound of the rapids. "Ms. Sullivan!"

Barely able to keep her head over the water, or keep _conscious_ as her body grew more and more weary as it continued to heal her, Chloe looked up in time to pass Dr. Nicolai as quick as a blink. The man had somehow gotten separated from both Jack and Tyler, and had smashed into one of the boulders, the dark water surrounding him proved that he'd gotten injured, and badly.

"HELP ME!" Dr. Nicolai cried out, but Chloe couldn't have swam against the current even if she _hadn't_ been on the verge of exhaustion. So she was helpless to do anything as the current swept her away in the blink of an eye, and suddenly she was falling…_falling_…falling down a long, long waterfall into the murky water below, the sound of Kathryn screaming from above her the only evidence that her friend had made it this far as well.

As she surfaced from the dark water, gasping for breath, Chloe turned around, trying to find Kathryn, find the others. Kathryn surfaced a couple of feet away from Chloe, gasping loudly for breath and slapping the surface of the water. "Kathryn!"

The scientist wiped at the water in her eyes and blinked, taking in more gulps of air before swimming towards Chloe, holding onto her hand and looking at her in worry. "Are you okay? Were you hurt?"

"I'm fine, I'm fine." Chloe assured her, knowing that her wounds had already closed up and by the time they got out of the water there wouldn't even be a scar on her flesh. It would be a little hard to explain the teeth marks in her suit, but she would manage somehow.

"Where's everyone?" Kathryn whispered as they both looked around, unable to see anything in the darkness around them.

"Kathryn! Ms. Sullivan!" They turned to see Briggs swimming towards them in the darkness. They were only able to see him in the pitch black due to the small light on his helmet. "Are you two okay? What happened back there?"

"Something had me back there, but I got free." Chloe looked away.

"No thanks to _you_!" Kathryn growled, turning her furious glare on him. "You were supposed to be our protection! You _ran away_!"

He winced. "It was the current--I couldn't get back to you!"

"Couldn't get back--_couldn't get BACK_--!" Kathryn tried to lunge at Briggs but Chloe held her back.

Something shifted in the water underneath them and Chloe and Kathryn screamed as something surfaced, and then felt silly because the person who surfaced was _Charlie_.

"There's something in the water!" She cried, looking terrified as she pulled off her goggles.

Briggs' eyes went wide. "We have to swim!"

"_Where_?" Kathryn snapped, obviously still pissed with him. "If you haven't realized, we're lost in the pitch dark, separated from the rest of our group, and there isn't any land in sight! _Nothing_ is in sight! Where do you want us to _swim_ to?!"

Briggs looked a mixture of offended, terrified, ashamed and pissed.

Chloe frowned, pressing her hand to the back of her neck and felt the smooth, still skin. It wasn't throbbing, so either whatever was under the water _wasn't_ one of those creatures--or the fact that she'd gotten bitten, and the fact that the parasites were probably now not only fighting each other but her healing powers--maybe it'd killed her ability to sense them.

"Fuck it all." Briggs cursed, pulling his goggles on and diving under the water.

"Think he's deserted us again?" Kathryn asked sarcastically, obviously preferring to be angry than terrified.

"Left you?" Charlie asked in a small, voice, obviously terrified.

"He left us up there alone with one of those creatures!" Kathryn exploded, glad to be able to vent her frustration.

"_What_?" Charlie looked up at the waterfall in horror. "There was one up there with us?"

The scientist nodded her head vehemently. "It grabbed a hold of Chloe and Briggs just _ran off_!"

Charlie's eyes widened as she turned to Chloe. "Are you all right, Ms. Sullivan? Are you hurt?"

Chloe shook her head, hand still firmly around the meteor rock just in case she would have to use it on anything else that would attack, because Briggs had been under for a little long for it not to worry them. "I'm fine. It just scared me more than anything." She smiled warily. "If it hadn't been for Kathryn--."

Briggs surfaced and pulled off his goggles. "Oh _shit_! It's some freaky and small kind of _friggin' eel!_" He reached into his backpack and grabbed a flare, lighting it and holding it under the water between them, obviously trying to scare the eel-like creature away.

"_Does anybody have eyes on Dr. Nicolai or Charlie?_" Jack's voice came through the receiver in Briggs' bag. "_Briggs, where the fuck are you?"_

Briggs winced and spoke into the mic. "I got Charlie, Kathryn and Chloe—"

"_He's got us_." Kathryn muttered under her breath.

Briggs ignored that. "Nicolai's wracked up on the rocks above the falls. He's in bad shape."

"_All right, flare's coming up. Swim to us when you see it._"

"I see them!" Charlie exclaimed in relief, pointing to the light that's just flared up in the darkness.

"Yeah." Briggs sounded relieved now that he wouldn't have to be in charge anymore. "Looks like a couple hundred yards."

"We can swim that." Kathryn interjected. "The bigger the group the safer we are."

"Safety in numbers." Chloe rephrased.

"Let's all swim there slowly together." Briggs commanded.

"To hell with _that_." Charlie announced, beginning to swim towards the light as fast as she could.

"Wait for us, Charlie!" Briggs called from behind the group.

"No, _you_ keep up with _us_!" Kathryn announced as she and Chloe began to swim alongside Charlie, obviously, the scientist was very much of a grudge-holder.

Briggs hurried up behind them, trying to keep up.

In record time they'd joined the other group, and Chloe's gaze met Jack's, nodding her head at his silent question on if she was okay.

"Stick close together." Jack ordered, and no one dared complain, finding some vain sense of safety all huddled together, floating in the calm, deep, dark, murky water.

The flare Top held lit a small circle around them, yet it really didn't do any good as in showing them a way to dry land.

A scream echoed throughout the cavern and they all twirled around and watched as Dr. Nicolai's body hurtled down the waterfall into the water beneath. He'd obviously found a way to free himself from the boulder he'd been trapped on and thrown himself back into the rapids despite his injury. He surfaced with a scream of pain.

"That's Dr. Nicolai." Jack announced as the flare died. "Top, light another one, I'm gonna go after him."

"_HELP ME_!" Dr. Nicolai could be heard calling as he tried to swim towards the light as Top lit another flare.

"We have to get him and ourselves out of the water quickly." Chloe said, grabbing Jack's arm to halt his movements. "Jack, he's bleeding."

Jack froze, realizing what she was saying. He nodded before turning his back on her and looking in the direction of the waterfall. "NICOLAI?"

"_I'M HERE!_" Nicolai's voice echoed from the darkness.

Jack began swimming into the darkness towards Dr. Nicolai, surprising everyone on how _quick_ he seemed to be moving in the water. Chloe watched him with narrowed eyes, guessing this to be another side effect of being infected with the parasite. She then placed her hand to her thigh and her fingers brushed against the teeth marks in her wetsuit, frowning, wondering what sort of clash was going on between the two different parasites, and her own mutation, inside of her body at that moment.

Shaking her head, she looked at the meteor rock in her hand and pulled off her backpack, opening a side pocket and depositing the stone safely in there before zippering it shut again and shouldering the backpack once more.

"What was that?" Kathryn asked, having noticed her actions.

"It's a rock I found while we were still diving, it caught my attention so I took it with me to be able to look at it later." So far that was the truth. "I hit whatever had me on the head with that--that's why it let me go. I think I might have damaged it's eye with the last blow."

"That's what divers do when attacked by sharks." Charlie announced, looking somewhat proud of her. "Hit the shark in the face and eyes."

Tyler's head swerved towards them violently. "You were attacked? Are you hurt? What happened?" He then turned on a wincing Briggs. "Where were you when this happened?"

"Swimming towards the rapids as fast as his fins could take him." Kathryn growled.

"I was _not_!" Briggs exclaimed, angry, _too_ angry for it not to seem suspicious. "The current was too strong! I couldn't swim against it!"

"What were you doing in the current without Chloe?" Tyler pressed on, eyes angry slits. "You were supposed to be looking after her!"

"Yes, well, you and Jack were supposed to be looking out after Dr. Nicolai and look what happened to _him_!" Briggs snapped back.

"Will you two _stop it already_?!" Charlie snapped, irritated with them.

Suddenly the sound of Nicolai's screams filled the dark chambers, and everyone turned in the water to look in the darkness in his direction.

"NICOLAI!" Jack yelled, swimming faster towards the man as Nicolai screamed, his body being jerked here and there violently from something that had him from under the water, the sound of bones breaking echoing loudly off the wall of the cavern.

"_Nicolai_!" Kathryn screamed in horror.

"Everybody stay put!" Top ordered.

"_NICOLAI_!" Kathryn made an attempt to try and swim to him, but Chloe blocked her, holding her back. "Let me go! Something's got Nicolai! We have to help him!"

"Fall back!" Top ordered. "Everybody in a circle! Backs to center!"

"_But we just can't STAY here—we have to help him!"_ Kathryn screamed, fighting against Chloe's hold on her. "_NICOLAI!"_

And suddenly, all was silent.

Nicolai's flashlight, floating above the water, the only proof that he'd ever been there in the first place.

Jack reached for the flashlight, looking around him slowly. "Dr. Nicolai?" And then suddenly Jack dove under the water and was gone.

"JACK?" Chloe called, letting go of Kathryn and peering into the darkness. There was no answer. "_JACK_?!"

"We can't just stay here." Briggs announced quickly. "There's got to be a shore someplace."

"Nobody's going anywhere until Jack gets back." Top announced in a deathly serious voice.

"What was that?" Briggs asked, fidgety, obviously terrified. "Did you hear that? Did somebody hear that?!"

Something made a _plopping_ sound behind them, and Top reached back into his backpack and pulled out a long knife.

"Oh, _shit!"_ Alex screamed, jerking and looking down at the water beneath him.

"_What_?" Tyler turned to the other man.

"What the hell was that?" Alex seemed close to having a breakdown as he continued to jerk in the water.

"Stop that!" Chloe snapped. "You'll only attract whatever it is more by jerking around like a wounded fish!"

Alex went deathly still.

Kathryn cried out and Chloe gasped as a long eel-like body slithered between them, brushing against their wetsuits.

"It's the friggin _eels_!" Briggs exclaimed in slight hysteria.

"They ain't _small_!" Charlie yelled, the light from the flare outlining the two long creatures slithering amongst them. "Why the hell did you tell us they were _small_?!"

"The one I saw _was_ small!" Briggs yelled back.

"Get back in a circle!" Top ordered.

"I can't take this!" Alex yelled, slapping the surface of the water frantically as an eel rubbed against him once more. "GOD!"

"They're leaving--_they're leaving_!" Tyler announced to the relief of all as the eels _indeed_ left the group alone and swam away into the darkness.

"Where's _Jack_?" Chloe asked once the quiet had settled amongst them. "Where _is_ he?"

The sound of gasping in the distance drew their attention, and they watched as Jack surfaced, breathing in deep gulps of air before turning in their direction and slowly swimming towards them…without Nicolai.

Silence descended on the group until Jack reached them, knowing what he was going to say, and yet still denying it until they heard it from his own mouth.

"It's over." Jack said, looking away for a moment in sadness before returning his attention to them. "Let's get the hell out of the water."

"He said he didn't want to go deeper, Jack. He was _your_ responsibility!" Kathryn exploded in despair, her voice choking. "He _said_ he didn't want to go _deeper_!"

"It's _over_, Kathryn." Jack looked her dead in the eyes before turning and swimming away.

Chloe reached over and squeezed Kathryn's shoulder before swimming after him, feeling her friend swimming next to her in agonized silence.

* * *

After what seemed like an eternity of swimming, Briggs finally called out the words they'd been dying to hear.

"There's a ledge here! We can walk!"

They all gathered against the ledge, their feet able to touch the ground, the water reaching them at mid-chest, backs against the cavern's wall. Jack took the lead and while Top would usually have gone next, the look Jack sent Chloe caused the handsome dark man to help her onto the ledge behind Jack and took his position behind her, the rest falling in line.

There hadn't been silence for a while now, the sounds of the sonar calls so loud that the others had been able to hear them as well, and Chloe could see that it bothered them greatly.

"What the hell _is_ that sound?" Alex finally snapped from behind Top.

"Echolocation." Kathryn and Chloe answered at the same time, one from the knowledge gained by books, the other from the sensitivity she'd discovered was only _growing_ now that the new parasite had been inside of her for almost an hour.

"Chloe was right from the beginning." Kathryn spoke softly from where she rounded the back of the line, close to Tyler and Briggs. "This thing can see us as easy as a bat sees a moth in complete darkness."

They continued to walk in silence after that, until they reached the shore and happily stood on dry land, changing from their diving fins to their shoes.

"Wait here." Jack announced from up ahead. "I'm gonna scout ahead."

Chloe frowned, watching him until long after he'd disappeared from sight, worried. Whatever that parasite was doing to Jack, it wasn't good, she could tell from how _pale_ he was becoming. Was she the only one who noticed the nearly _purple_ bags under his eyes?

She shivered, hugging herself.

What would the parasite do to Jack?

What would the parasite do to _her_?

"It's a strong current, Kathryn." Briggs' voice was heard saying, and Chloe turned to see him and the scientist bending by the water, watching it flowing into a tunnel. "It's definitely worth a try."

"Yeah." Kathryn agreed.

Chloe shared looks with Top and joined Charlie, Alex and Tyler as they went towards the two studying the current.

"That's _gotta_ come up on the surface." Alex announced, shining his flashlight into the tunnel the water led into.

"I'm not sure I like the idea of deep water right now." Top admitted, looking around the new cavern they found themselves in.

Chloe _sensed_ him before he emerged from the small, side cavern he'd disappeared into, and that was when she began to get an idea of what the parasite might be doing inside of her.

Charlie turned when Jack appeared, and looked at him expectantly.

"Tyler." Jack spoke.

Tyler turned at his brother's voice and nodded for him to speak.

"You and I are going up this wall." He pointed behind him at the large cavern wall.

Chloe looked up at the wall in question and gulped. Then again, she'd take rock climbing to swimming in a monster-infested stream _any day_.

"But this is the main water flow." Kathryn stood. "We just follow it out of the system."

Jack ignored her, continuing to talk them. "When we get to the top, we'll secure ropes and the rest of you will come up on ascenders."

"Jack," Charlie cut in. "I'm the best climber. I'll go first."

He shook his head at her

"Nobody's climbing _anywhere_." Briggs announced loudly from where he stood next to Kathryn. "There's a _huge_ exit sign here in front of us! All we have to do is--."

"You don't have a goddamn clue what's going on." Jack interrupted with irritation.

Everyone shared looks except Chloe, who kept her gaze fully on Jack's face, wondering if it was her idea or if his eyes seemed a slightly different color.

"None of you do." Jack continued, and once again Chloe worried as she realized just how _pale_ he was. "It's a _trap_."

"A _trap_?" Briggs exclaimed in disgust. "Come _on_ Jack! Whatever it is, it's a friggin _animal_! It doesn't _think_, it doesn't make _traps_, it just _hunts!_ It just goes on _instinct_!"

"Like _your_ instinct to run when there's any danger?" Chloe hissed, surprising everyone by the vehemence in her words. "I'm sorry Kathryn, but just the _fact_ that Briggs thinks going down that tunnel is a good idea is enough to tell me it _isn't_!" She folded her arms over her chest. "I'm with Jack on this. We already know that that creature lives in the water, so we should stay _out_ of it."

Top continued to look around the cavern, deciding. "The wall's the safest option."

"Jack and Chloe are right." Charlie announced. "I'll go."

"I said _no_." Jack turned to Charlie in exasperation. He turned his brother. "Let's go."

Everyone reluctantly followed behind.

Chloe found herself at the back of the group with Kathryn, ignoring the men as they got to the wall and began discussing the best routes to get to the point Jack was showing them with the beam of his flashlight. "I'm not against you, Kathryn, or don't think that your idea has merit, but I don't want to risk it. Not after that thing nearly got me above the falls."

Kathryn sighed and looked up into Chloe's face as the men went their separate ways to take off their wetsuits, change into their dry clothes, and start what must be done. "I understand that, Chloe, really I do. I'm not mad at you." She smiled weakly before suddenly remembering something and going to her knees, looking at Chloe's wetsuit before finding what she was looking for and trailing her fingers over the bite marks in the suit with a gasp of horror. "It bit you!"

"I'm fine, it only got the suit." The blonde quickly reassured, putting down her backpack and beginning to undo the zipper of her wetsuit, peeling it off of her body to reveal the muscle shirt and shorts she wore underneath. Stepping out of the suit, she let Kathryn touch the unblemished skin of her thigh.

"_Fascinating_." Kathryn whispered, shaking her head before standing and beginning to change out of her wetsuit as well. "The chances of that grabbing you and tearing into your suit without even breaking your skin is near to _impossible_, do you know how _lucky_ you are?"

"Yeah, lucky." Chloe refused to meet her gaze as she went through her backpack looking for a pants and a different shirt to put on. Her gaze instead went to Jack, where he was sitting on a stone, putting on his shoes.

Kathryn trailed her gaze and stiffened, turning to Chloe. "I understand your loyalty to him, he's taken special care of you, but Chloe, you have to realize that things have changed since the expedition started." The scientist announced in a low whisper. "Jack's _ill_. He's not fit to lead anymore."

Chloe tore her gaze from him and turned to her friend. "I'm sorry about Dr. Nicolai. I know you two were friends from before this expedition."

Tears made Kathryn's eyes watery and she looked away, biting down on her bottom lip.

"But that _wasn't_ Jack's fault." Chloe went on to say. "He and Tyler weren't able to keep a hold of Dr. Nicolai, they both lost him in the rapids. It was an unfortunate event and he was bleeding, I saw the blood myself when I went passed him. The creature that was after me obviously became attracted by the smell of his blood."

Kathryn whimpered and she closed her eyes.

Chloe placed a hand on the elder woman's shaking shoulders. "It was a horrible tragedy, but it wasn't Jack's fault."

"But Jack _forced_ us to come down the rapids!" Kathryn cried, turning to Chloe. "Nicolai didn't _want_ to come! If we hadn't gone down--!"

"We would have been cornered by that creature and attacked." Chloe cut in. "One of us would have been killed, no matter how this turned out, that creature would have gotten its belly full."

"CHARLIE!" Jack's voice caused them to jerk towards him, following his horrified gaze to find the petite blonde already high upon the wall. He got up and ran towards the wall. "I told you _no_!"

"We both know I'm the best climber here, Jack!" Charlie called back down as stubbornly as him as she climbed higher and higher very quickly, rope tied around her waist.

"Hey!" Tyler called. "Be careful!"

Top hurried and grabbed the rope, supplying her with more space as she made her fast ascent.

Briggs was by his side in a second helping to quickly untangle the rope. "GET YOUR ASS BACK DOWN HERE, CHARLIE!"

"I'll be all right!" She called back down on them.

"That girl's quick, man." Briggs announced. "Get the rope, Top!"

Charlie paused and inserted the first security hook into a crevice. "Okay. I'm on belay." She called down.

"On belay." Briggs repeated.

"_Damn_, that girl moves fast." Top announced admiringly.

"Be careful up here, Charlie!" Briggs called.

She was so far up by then that she probably couldn't hear them.

Jack pulled his microphone to his mouth and spoke. "Charlie, you got good hold to your right."

Nobody asked him how he could see that in this darkness and from such a far distance.

"Keep moving right." He added into the mic.

Charlie suddenly disappeared from sight.

"I think she's over the edge." Alex announced, his flashlight beam had been faithfully trained on her during the climb.

"ALL RIGHT!" Briggs pumped the air in excitement.

"How are we going to follow that?" Top asked Jack. "She's disappeared."

"She just went over the bump." Jack assured him.

"I can't even see her." Kathryn whispered to Chloe's right.

"_Safe_!" Charlie's exhausted voice came through the communication device.

Everyone turned to Jack.

"Talk to me, Charlie." He spoke into the mic. "What's going on? Is the line set? We're ready to climb, Charlie."

The sound of her panting heavily could be heard. Obviously the climb had been a tough one, even for the best climber in the team.

"Charlie?" Jacked asked again.

"_I'm over the ledge_." Her voice responded after another pant. "_I can feel a draft_."

"I'm coming up." Jack told her. "Stay put."

"_No complaints here_." Came her tired response.

Tyler grinned at Top as Jack began the ascent. "We'll be out of here in no time."

Suddenly the sound of screaming echoed throughout the cavern and the rope began to pull through the hoops at an alarming pace.

"CHARLIE!" Jack screamed.

"She's falling." Chloe gasped. "Someone grab the rope!" When it reached the end and suddenly Top was momentarily yanked off his feet, Chloe realized that the dark man had tied it to his buckle.

"_GET ME DOWN!_" Charlie's voice screamed, and yet they couldn't see her. "_IT'S UP HERE!"_

"Dammit!" Briggs cursed. "Do something, Top!"

"Get that rope free!" Jack yelled down at them.

"_JACK_!" Charlie screamed in terror from somewhere in the darkness above.

The sound of the creature's sonar calls echoed throughout the cavern.

"_GET ME DOWN!"_

"Motherfucker!" Briggs was obviously very big on cursing, demanding things of others, causing trouble, and never being useful in any sort of situation. What the devil had Jack and his people been _thinking_ by hiring him in the _first_ place? "_TOP--!_"

"Shut the _fuck_ up Briggs!" Top growled as he and Tyler tried to free the knot in the rope to give Charlie working space.

"Oh my God--_Charlie_!" Kathryn's scream caused everyone to look up in time to see Charlie swinging over the vast nothingness between the wall she'd been climbing and the one across from it, and pulling out her knife she cut the rope holding her and flew through the air, hurtling into the wall, grabbing onto whatever she could, amazingly in one piece and standing.

"_Charlie_!" Briggs screamed, shinning the light on her.

Her relieved laughter echoed throughout the cavern as she secured a hook in the crevice of the wall and hooked the bundled of rope wrapped around her arm onto it, making her now secure to make her descent.

The sound of sonar calls once more vibrated off the walls of the cavern, and Chloe placed a hand to her head as the vibrations cut through her painfully. Her body began to heat up rapidly and the sounds of the sonar clicks became horribly distorted, causing her to become dizzy and disoriented.

No one noticed, all eyes on Charlie as she turned from where she was already making her descent and shone her light at the darkness in the direction where she'd left the creature crawling down the wall at her.

Her light bounced off of a large body with bat-like wings outstretched, gliding down towards her.

"_THEY FLY!"_ she screamed as it neared her. "_THEY FREAKING FLY!_" She turned towards the wall and closed her eyes as the bat-like creature swooped down on her, covering her completely against the wall with its enormous body and wings.

The lights of the flashlights blurred around Chloe as the room seemed to spin round and round and round so rapidly it was hard for her to remain on her feet.

"CHARLIE!" Jack screamed from where he was rapidly climbing down the opposite wall. "COME AT ME YOU BASTARD! LEAVE HER ALONE!"

But Chloe didn't hear any of the commotion as her feet gave out on her and she collapsed to the ground, body jerking violently against the rock floor in a near _epileptic_ way as pain shot through her body. Blurry images of ghastly faces flashed through her eyes like a bad movie, and she heard the screams of something inhumane, felt the vibrations bouncing off of her, and suddenly she heard the flapping of wings.

There were screams around her, but they didn't sound right, they--some were so high and other so _low_, all too close and yet so far, and then all the air was forced out of her lungs as something heavy landed on top of her, pressing down on her chest as her body continued to jerk erratically, as her eyes continued to see visions of something too blurry to make out, and her ears were deaf to the true sounds of things.

"CHLOE!" The scream finally made sense, and yet the blonde was confused, her mind hazy as her body finally stopped jerking and she tried to breathe, but the weight on her chest was just so _heavy_. Why where they screaming her name? Wasn't it _Charlie_ who was in trouble?

The stench of death and something putrid hit her nostrils as something pressed softly against the skin of her face, _sniffing_.

"_DO SOMETHING!"_ Kathryn sounded _terrified_. "_GET IT OFF OF HER_!"

Chloe groaned, feeling the heat rage inside of her as her body fought the effects of the parasite. She closed her eyes tightly, shaking her head when she felt something _wet_ trailing up her cheek, stilling when she heard a resounding growl above her.

Suddenly the effects of the parasite within her wore off and Chloe tensed, opening her eyes and screaming as she looked into the face of what she could only truly describe as a horrific _demon_.

"_Now_ she screams!" Briggs could be heard exclaiming.

The creature trapping her body to the floor, with its wings around her, hiding her from the others, roared, the sound blending in with her scream as it echoed off the walls of the cave.

"Don't make any sudden movements." Alex hissed at someone. "It could attack her!"

"It has her pinned to the damned _floor_!" Tyler snapped. "I _think_ that qualifies as an _attack_!"

"Get the _fuck_ out of my way." Jack's voice growled.

"What the hell are you--?"

The sound of something flying through the air caused the creature to look up, and it shrieked as the knife embedded itself firmly in the middle of its eyes. The creature pushed off of Chloe, screeching and clawing at its forehead, trying to get the knife out, its wings flapped out and knocked Briggs violently onto his ass.

Chloe found herself pulled to her feet, yet couldn't even _look_ at her rescuer, wide, terrified eyes on the creature as it continued to jerk before it suddenly collapsed to the ground, dead, killed by a knife to the brain. Even after it was dead, Chloe couldn't take her eyes off of it, unable to see the others as they hurried to her to make sure that she was fine, unable to hear them asking her millions of questions.

It was finally someone shaking her shoulders violently that broke her from her traumatic trance, and she turned to look into Jack's eyes.

"Are. You. Okay?" He intoned each word, as if he'd said them before. He probably _had_.

She nodded wordlessly.

Kathryn pushed Alex out of the way to look Chloe over, she was still only wearing her shorts and a muscle shirt. "Are you hurt? Were you cut?"

Chloe shook her head. "No—no, it didn't bite me." She frowned, making a face as she rubbed her cheek it disgust. "But I think it _licked_ me."

Kathryn paused in her search of Chloe's body, looking up at her friend in concern before nodding to the others that she was, indeed, unhurt.

"The girl has the luck of the devil!" Briggs announced. "This is the second time that one of those mother fuckers attacked her and she's gotten away without a _scratch_!"

Jack twirled on Briggs, eyes darkening. "_Second_ time?"

Briggs suddenly looked frightened, and gulped.

"_HEY GUYS!_" Charlie's voice could be heard calling as she was nearing the bottom of the wall. "_IS SHE OKAY? DID SHE GET HURT_?" She dropped the last couple of feet to the ground and hurried over, looking no worse for the wear considering all she'd been through.

"You're okay." Chloe whispered in relief.

"_You're_ okay." Charlie gasped. "Thank God! I thought--when that _thing_ had gotten you--!"

"When was she attacked the _first_ time?" Jack ignored the girls and continued glaring at Briggs.

"What I don't understand is why it just _jumped_ off of me before it could even _bite_ me and went straight for _you_." Charlie was telling Chloe.

"I left her in your care!" Jack snapped.

"The current was too strong!" Briggs was obviously sticking to that story. "I couldn't do anything!"

"EVERYONE SHUT UP!" Top exploded, and then took in a deep breath when silence once more reigned. "We've been lucky right now. Not only didn't we lose any of our group, but we learnt vital information about this creature. Not only can it survive on land and underwater--but it can _fly_ at the same time."

"In other words, if we climb up the wall we're screwed, and if we go in the water, we're screwed." Alex recapped. "And if we stay _here_--_WE'RE SCREWED!"_

"We need to go over our options again." Kathryn announced. "We need to decide what to do."

"We climb." Jack told her. "That's our only option."

"No, it is _not_." Kathryn glared at him. "The water is our best bet!"

"It's a _trap!"_

"_PEOPLE_!" Charlie exclaimed, throwing her hands up. "Ms. Sullivan and I have just lived through a _very_ horrible experience, so we'd appreciate it if you all just _shut up_ for a bit!"

They nodded and slowly everyone sat down.

Chloe found herself sitting next to Charlie, the other blonde girl and her finding comfort in each other and their close call.

The sonar cries from creatures unseen vibrated off the walls of the cavern, and Chloe closed her eyes, hugging herself as she shivered, telling herself it was paranoid to believe that they were now all being aimed at _her_.

* * *

Hey everyone! I was so happy to see more people reviewing that I updated quicker! How about that? Did you like this chapter? Please review and lemme know!


	5. Chapter 5

**Disclaimer: I do not own Smallville or The Cave or any characters mentioned in either. I, unfortunately, also don't own Lex Luthor (Michael Rosenbaum would be more than sufficient), Jack McAlister, OR Tyler McAlister either. Shucks. My life SUCKS man! Also, I do not own THE ART OF WAR, mentioned in this chapter.**

_I wanna want to thank the reviewer 're' for mentioning Lois and Clark--because I'd forgotten to write something at the end of the last chapter about Lois and Lex! So I'm adding it to the beginning of this chapter instead, which really doesn't make any different because it's still around the same time._

_And I really have to say it--I am SPOILING YOU PEOPLE! __**Laughs**__. Here's another update for THE CAVE for all those people who reviewed--remember--reviews are inspiration for me!_

* * *

"Really Lex, will you _stop_ being so _dramatic_?" Lois Lane rolled her eyes by her desk at the Daily Planet, listening to her cousin's boss and very close friend have a near nervous _breakdown_. "Honestly I _knew_ from the moment Chloe said she was going to Romania for a couple of weeks that you wouldn't be able to take it. 'Two weeks', I told Smallville, 'two weeks is all Lex will be able to survive without Chloe to tell him how to live his life'. But Clark--the poor, naïve, _trusting_ soul--he had more faith in you, he bet me _three_ weeks before you broke down and went to get her with some lame excuse."

There was an exasperated sigh on the other side of the phone. "Lois, I do _not_ let Chloe 'tell me how to live my life'. And that is not what I'm calling about anyway, I really think that something bad is happening to her."

Lois shook her head, leaning back in her seat and ignoring Jimmy Olsen, the geeky photographer who'd been giving her the eye the last couple of months. She was _so_ not going there! "And _why_ do you think that something is wrong with Chloe's expedition?" She suddenly frowned. "Did someone get into contact with you from Romania?"

There was a moment's silence. "No, and Chloe said that the whole thing would last for about 12 days, but I know Chloe, Lois, and I _know_ that something bad's happening. I feel it in my bones, and I know that if what I'm feeling isn't more than a 'nervous break down', as you so delicately put it, then you'd never forgive me for not warning you in case something happened."

Lois sat up straight in her seat, realizing that Lex might be onto something. The billionaire had always been attuned with her cousin, both were freakily able to know what the other liked, how they were feeling, _what_ they were feeling, and while Lois had always attested it to the fact that the two of them were deep in denial about the mutual attraction they'd had for _years_, Lois couldn't help but _wonder_.

"I also called to ask if you knew where Clark was." Lex sighed, his voice tired, as if he hadn't been able to sleep. "I've been trying to get a hold of him to see if, to see if he could maybe take a quick trip to the Carpathians and, I don't know, maybe _scan_ the place just to make sure that this isn't anything other than my 'overactive imagination'."

Lois made a face at the mention of Clark's powers. When she'd found out while still living in Smallville over a year ago that the farmboy she liked to tease was a super-powered _alien_, well, it'd taken some time to get used to, but she hadn't treated him any different, if anything she'd teased and taunted him even _more_, telling him he was made of steel and could take it.

"I think Smallville's going through some weird phase from his, err, _home town_." Lois frowned, remembering how _odd_ Clark had been acting around her the last couple of months, and that behavior had just gotten _odder_ ever since he began working at the Daily Planet in the desk right across from hers two months ago. "The guy's been acting weird lately, and I think he had to go and get serviced--or whatever it is he does in that Fortress place I keep hearing about. Bottom line is that he's _incommunicado_, took sick leave and everything, I don't know when he'll show his face again."

"He doesn't get _serviced_, Lois, he isn't a _car._" Lex's voice was the perfect mixture of annoyance, tiredness, and amusement. "He goes to be instructed by his father."

"Yes, well, I never understood that part very well, but that doesn't matter, as long as he returns back to his normal self--or as normal as he can be given the circumstances--I'll be happy."

"I'm sure you will."

She didn't like the smug tone he was using. She was about to call him on it and dissuade any funny ideas he might have in his bald head about her and a certain farmboy, when she heard Lex sighed and mutter something about 'doing it yourself', which was when she suddenly realized what Lex was going to do.

"You're going to go to Romania, aren't you?" The star reporter of the Daily Planet announced, frowning darkly as she understood what that meant. "You're really worried."

"Of _course_ I am." Lex sounded stressed. "This is _Chloe_ we're talking about, she nearly died on almost every one of her adventures during her high school years--that was one of the reasons I wanted her to take the job at Lexcorp, to keep her safe! And now--now I _know_ something's wrong and I don't know _what_ I'd do if something happened to Chloe."

Lois frowned, looking at Perry's office and then at the picture of Chloe and her that she had on her desk. "Well, you've convinced me." She sighed. "Order an extra bottle of champagne for your private jet, Luthor, I'm coming along with you."

* * *

Chloe hadn't known when she'd fallen asleep. It'd been bound to happen though; her body was exhausted from not only having healed her wounds earlier on, but from the ongoing battle raging within her. She'd been having a dream, a memory more than anything else, of the trip to the Caribbean that Lex and her had taken some summers back when he'd decided that they both needed a vacation. It'd been fun, they'd gone on the Cayman Islands, a small trio of islands, and spent a week in each. Lois and Clark had come along for the ride, and they'd had a great time together enjoying the unique beauty and differences of each island.

Chloe remembered lying down on the yacht Lex had rented, sunbathing, listening to Lois and Clark as they swam in the water and taunted each other--those two had to _so_ stop denying the attraction they felt for one another!--and listening to Lex as he read to her from The Art of War, one of the only things his father had ingrained in him that he'd grown up to enjoy.

_"If your enemy is secure at all points, be prepared for him," Lex's voice had drifted into her ear. "If he is superior in strength, evade him."_

_"What if I can't evade him?" Chloe'd asked with a chuckle, eyes closed, enjoying the heat of the sun on her skin. "What does the great Sun Tzu have to say about that?"_

_"Good question," Lex announced, obviously pleased that she'd been actually listening and not zoning him out. "Sun Tzu says that when in war, the way is to avoid what is strong and to strike at what is weak."_

_"Are you __**sure**__ he wasn't your father in a past life?" Chloe deadpanned turning over so that she was lying on her back on the deck of the yacht._

_Lex chuckled. "No, I'm pretty sure he was __**Hitler**__."_

_"Yeah, that is probably the one." She grinned, eyes closed. "Okay, continuing with the lesson, how would I know my enemy's weakness to be able to strike it?"_

_"That's easy, Chlo." He announced, not even reading from the book anymore but quoting it by heart. "If you know the enemy and yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles."_

_"It's disturbing that you can quote that book."_

_He chuckled once more. "If there's something good my father ever taught me, Chloe, it was to study my enemy's weakness." He paused." Study its weakness, Chlo."_

_Study it…study it…study it…_

Chloe gasped as she awoke, leaning forwards and taking in a deep breath. She realized that she'd fallen asleep on the ground, using her backpack as a pillow, and Charlie was resting as well, but the others were huddled together, talking.

"There's enough secured rope to make it to the opening." Jack was saying, as the others stood around where he sat with his back to the wall.

"What's happening to you?" Alex's question caused Chloe get up, wincing at her sore muscles. "Your _eyes_…"

"As long as we stay together as a group, we can hold them back." Jack trudged on, cutting into whatever it was that Alex had been about to say.

Kathryn frowned, going closer to Jack and pausing when he turned to look at her. "I think I know now what's happening to you."

Chloe joined the group, wiping away the sleep from her eyes as she yawned. No one noticed her arrival as they kept their gaze on Jack, and now that she was closer, Chloe gasped when she saw how _pale_ Jack had gotten during the time she'd slept. He was almost _ridiculously_ so, like one of those horrible D-class movie vampires.

Jack turned his gaze to her immediately, and Chloe's eyes widened when she saw _his_. The blue of his eyes had changed shade completely, and his pupils had morphed in shape, resembling a four-point star.

"_Jack_…" Chloe whispered as she suddenly understood what she was sure he'd known all along, suddenly understanding exactly _what_ the parasite was doing to him.

"It's a parasite." Kathryn's voice cut into the moment. "The reason you're so sick, why you're changing, it's because you're infected with the parasite we found in the mole and the salamander."

"That's from a _parasite_?" Tyler asked, worry darkening his voice as he looked from his brother to the scientist.

"It mutates the host," Kathryn nodded. "So they can both survive down here in this environment."

"Is that what's going to happen to all of us?" Alex asked, horror written on his every feature.

"I don't know, Alex." Kathryn told the cameraman.

"Will you all stop talking as if Jack isn't _here_?" Chloe snapped, glaring at them for being so insensitive.

"We're not talking about him as if he's not here, Chloe." Kathryn announced tersely. "We're discussing a very serious situation at hand." Her gaze shot to Jack, who was looking up at the darkness of the ceiling as if watching something. "I'd say it entered your bloodstream through one of your cuts. Jack, it's affecting you nervous system."

Jack didn't seem to be paying attention to Kathryn or the conversation at all, his narrowed gaze swung onto Chloe, looking her up and down as if confused about something.

"So the other cavers…" Tyler whispered. "This happened to them?"

Kathryn nodded.

"So, what, it just _ate_ them?" Briggs asked, obviously not having heard the words passed between Kathryn and Tyler.

Jack then looked up at the darkness of the ceiling again, eyes narrowed, tracking something.

Chloe raised her gaze, unable to pierce the darkness above and not sure whether she was disappointed that she couldn't see what Jack was watching--or _relieved_. And then…and then she _heard_ it. It was the sound of small, minute pebbles falling from the cavern's ceiling as something slowly crawled upside down in the darkness. The sound itself was faint, and it should be easily be drowned out by the other sounds of the caves--and it _had_ been--until she'd concentrated as Jack had been doing.

_It's started_. Chloe took in a deep breath, trying not to give away her sudden fear as she remembered that Jack's first symptom had been enhanced hearing. _I'm turning into one of those monsters, just like Jack is_.

"No." The scientist shook her head, folding her arms over her chest. "They weren't _eaten_ by the creatures. They _are_ the creatures. Right, Jack?" She didn't wait for him to answer, to even acknowledge that she was speaking. "And now they're mutants and there's nothing human left in them."

Chloe flinched visibly. Is that what Kathryn thought of mutants? Even _without_ the parasite within her, Chloe was a mutant, and it hurt to hear someone she'd considered a friend referring to her kind in that way.

Suddenly the room echoed with multiple sonar calls, more than they'd ever heard before at once, causing everyone to look up at the ceiling.

Jack, who'd been doing that from the start, just smirked darkly. "They're enjoying this, Kathryn."

"So now you understand them, Jack?" Briggs snapped, and then winced and looked away in fear when Jack turned and glared at him.

"Jack," Tyler spoke, tearing his brother's attention from Briggs to him. "Jack, you're gonna be fine. You've gotten us this far."

" 'Got us this far', Tyler?" Briggs snapped, twirling on the dark haired man. "What he got was Dr. Nicolai killed! And he nearly got Charlie dead as well!"

"Hey!" Charlie's voice surprised everyone since they'd thought she'd been sleeping, but the blonde was behind them, glaring at them. "Jack _told_ me not to climb and _I_ went against orders--so don't blame him for what happened!"

"It doesn't matter, Charlie! It was his idea to climb in the first place!" Briggs turned to the only woman member of their spelunking team. "But I say _no more_, I'm _done_ following his orders!"

"You ungrateful sonofabitch." Top shook his head at the problematic white man.

"Look, let's not fight about this." Kathryn spoke up. "Let's just follow what we know. The river's the way out."

"Kathryn's right." Briggs announced. "I'm with _her_."

"You're with _yourself_, Briggs." Chloe snapped, sick of him and his attitude.

"Think whatever you _want_, Ms. Sullivan." Briggs spat.

"Oh, you don't _want_ to know what I _think_ about you."

He ignored her, walking to Kathryn's side. "Who else is coming?" The silence was deafening. "Charlie?"

"_Fuck you_, Briggs." Charlie spat, brushing past him, slamming into his shoulder angrily as she made her way to Jack's side and turned to look at the others defiantly. "I'm with _Jack_. _He_ was the one trying to climb up to me when that _thing_ came after me--_not you._"

A muscle in Briggs' cheek jumped as he turned to the man standing next to Kathryn. "Alex?"

The Asian paused, looking at his feet, looking torn.

"If you ever wanna see the sun again, you should follow me now." Jack said, resting his arms on his knees, looking ahead of him at nothing in particular.

Alex paused, giving Jack a long look, his dark eyes scanning Jack's pale skin, his eyes, and his bandages before Alex sighed and took another step towards Kathryn, silently making his choice.

Jack stood and walked away, Charlie and Top following faithfully behind him, going to the wall and preparing what they would need to make the climb.

"This is _bullshit_." Tyler glared at Briggs, Kathryn and Alex. "We _have_ to stay _together_."

"Tyler, _look_ at him." Briggs motioned to where Jack, Charlie and Top were working together in silence. "He's _not_ human."

Chloe winced.

"He's my _brother_." Tyler narrowed his eyes at the other man. "And he's more _human_ now than you _ever_ were."

The men tensed, ready to pounce if provoked further.

"You can't possibly plan on staying with them, Chloe." Kathryn spoke, looking at her intensely, misreading Chloe's wince. "Jack is turning into a _monster_. Who knows? _He_ might be the one leading us into a trap."

"Yeah." Briggs nodded, tearing his glare from Tyler's and looking at the short blonde. "He already fucking let the secret out that he understands the monsters, who says that they haven't been working together from the start?"

The sound of a slap echoed off of the walls of the cavern so loudly that Jack and the others turned at the sound. Even _Chloe_ was surprised at the fact that she, a pacifist, had raised her hand against someone--but what shocked her further was the _force_ behind the blow, the strength that'd snapped Briggs' head in the opposite direction and left an angry red imprint of her hand on his cheek.

"Fuck _JESUS_!" Briggs yelled, cradling the side of his face tenderly, voice tinged in pain.

Chloe trembled slightly as something within her bubbled, something foreign, something _powerful_.

Tyler placed an arm around her shoulder, emotionless eyes on the three deserters. "Good luck." And with that, he led Chloe away from them and towards where Jack and the others were waiting.

"Let's get in the water." Kathryn could be heard sighing. "And let's go home."

Silence descended on the camp until the three deserters had entered the water and disappeared into the tunnel. Chloe took in a deep breath, trying to calm down and stop the shaking in her hands.

"We're ready to climb." Top informed Jack. "We should get going, they're going to know that we're a smaller group and that we're weaker."

Suddenly Chloe remembered her dream and she turned, heading towards the dead body of the creature that'd attacked both Charlie and her. A shiver of disgust ran up her spine as she circled it, not even looking up as she heard Jack coming up behind her. Green eyes surveyed the creature before she stopped circling, eyeing the head, where the wound it'd received through its skull was open and still oozing blood.

"What are you doing?" Jack asked, standing a little behind her.

"I'm finally putting all those hours of listening to Lex read from _The Art of War_ to practice." Chloe murmured, reaching out and making a face of disgust as she pressed down against the dead creature's skull, finding it tough as bones--like the rest of the body, until she reached the section right between the eyes and a little further up. The skull sunk in slightly at her touch and she gasped, pulling away and wiping her hands on her clothes. "If you can't evade a stronger enemy, find it's weakness."

She turned and looked at Jack. "When I was attacked above the falls, I got the creature to let go by hitting it in the forehead with a rock--I think I got it in the eye too--and you brought this one down with a blow right to the forehead as well."

"It's their Achilles Heel." Charlie whispered.

"Or Goliath's Forehead." Tyler grinned.

Top just looked relieved, yet still worried. "We should get going."

Chloe nodded, sending one last look in the direction of the tunnel their friends had disappeared into. "Yes. Let's."

* * *

The ascent was a long, arduous one, and it took them much longer to get close to the top than it had Charlie on her first go. For security reasons Jack had gone first, with Chloe and Charlie following, Tyler and Top bringing up the back, and as they grew closer and closer to the edge, Chloe felt more and more uneasy. With the fact that her body no longer warned her when the creatures were near thanks to the infestation now occurring in her body, Chloe couldn't help but fear that they had a legion of the creatures above, waiting for them patiently on the ledge.

"When I get back to civilization, I'm going to start going to the gym with Lois." Chloe panted, pulling herself upwards on the steep wall, telling herself over and over again that they were almost to the top…and to not look down.

"Who's Lois?" Tyler asked from below.

"She's my cousin, she works at the Daily Planet." Chloe groaned, her arms trembling with fatigue as she climbed. "Ever since her father and mine died we're the only family each other has."

"_Shush_." Jack hissed, freezing.

"What--?" Charlie looked up at him.

"_Listen_!" Jack snapped.

The group remained silent, and then Chloe heard it. She turned around and shone the light of the flashlight strapped to her hand behind her time to scream as the large, bat-like creature swooped down on her, its claws boring into her shoulders as it took off with her after slicing the rope tied around her waist.

"CHLOE!" Tyler screamed as the creature flew upwards with her in its clutches.

"Dammit!" Top cursed. "It cut through the rope! 'Goes on instinct' my _ass_!"

"SOMEONE DO _SOMETHING_!" Charlie screamed.

"_Let GO of me_!" Chloe screamed, clawing at the hands that had her as the creature flew over the ledge. "_LET __**GO**__!"_

"HOLD ON!" Jack could be heard screaming from below. "I'M COMING!"

"_HOLDING ON IS __**NOT**__ THE ISSUE_!" Chloe screamed back as the creature zoomed away with her, her scream echoing throughout the cavern, and suddenly there was a dash of movement and the creature shrieked in pain as another rammed into it, the blow like that of a Mack Truck as the jerk caused the creature to let go of her, and Chloe cried out as she was flung into a wall and slid down, skin scraping and body bruised.

The creatures landed on the ground with a loud thud, snapping their fangs at each other menacingly, throwing their heads back and roaring before circling each other.

Chloe slowly stood, wincing at the pain and burn in her ribs, pressing her back against the wall, watching as the creatures circled each other, fully focused on each other. The blonde took advantage of the distraction and inched away slowly, making sure that they didn't notice her as she slowly made her escape. The creatures snarled at each other, and Chloe breathed out in relief when she backed around the corner, readying to run away.

Turning around slowly, thanking all holy for the way of escape, she froze when she came face to face with yet _another_ of the creatures.

The monstrosity roared, saliva splattering her face, backing her up against the wall, baring its teeth.

And yet in seconds the two creatures from moments ago swooped in, barreling into the third, and a fight broke out between the three of them. Blood spurted and pained, inhumane screams echoed off of the cavern as the creatures seemed one body, moving with such rapidness, the sound of flesh tearing mixing with the howls of agony and anger.

Chloe, eyes wide in horror, jumped when something heavy came down on her shoulder, and she would have screamed if a hand hadn't covered her mouth.

"_Shh_, don't scream." Jack whispered in her ear. "We'll use this distraction to get passed them.

Chloe nodded silently, turning to look at him when he let go of her, seeing Tyler, Charlie and Top hurrying towards them, freezing when they saw the creatures tearing at each other viciously.

Jack motioned for them to follow him, and his eyes quickly searched the cavern before finding the tunnel he wanted, hurrying towards it and pulling Chloe behind him as he entered it. Thankfully, the tunnel was narrow enough that even if the creatures realized she was gone, they wouldn't be able to fit in it, so the small group made their way through it in silence before coming out on the other side.

The moment he'd scanned the room, apparently satisfied that they were alone and safe at the moment, Jack turned on Chloe, pushing her angrily against the wall.

"_Hey_!" Tyler exclaimed.

"Why didn't you tell me you were infected?" Jack hissed, his four-point star pupils contracting in anger as his hands roamed her body.

"Get your hands _off_ of me!" Chloe growled, pushing against his chest futilely.

"_Jack_." Top warned.

"_Where _are you _injured_?" Jack snapped, pulling away, eyes roaming her body. "How _long_ have you been infected?"

"More than two hours! Almost three!" She snapped back, glaring at him, causing the others to gasp at her in surprise.

Jack stepped back as if he'd been slapped. "Three _hours_?"

"Oh my God." Charlie gasped, turning to look at Chloe in understanding. "It happened above the falls, didn't it?"

Chloe sighed and nodded. "One of the creatures bit into my thigh."

"But I don't understand." Top frowned, looking her over. "I _saw_ you in only shorts. You weren't injured."

"That's right." Tyler nodded. "I spoke personally to Kathryn while you were sleeping and she said that as soon as we were on dry land she checked you over to make sure that you didn't need medical attention, and that while your wetsuit had bite marks in it, your thigh was untouched."

"The wounds had already closed up and healed completely by that time." Chloe sighed, resigned to the fact that she was going to have to tell them everything.

Jack stood apart from them, arms folded over his chest, eyes narrowed suspiciously at her. "Explain."

There was silence as she took in a deep breath. "I lived in Smallville, Kansas, from the age of fourteen to seventeen. Smallville was hit by two different meteor showers, leaving behind green meteor rocks that _altered_ the people in the town." She pulled off her back pack and opened the side compartment, pulling out the Green K. "I found this while we were diving. _This_ is what changed the people in my old hometown. It affected everyone differently, gave some the power to blow up things, cause fire, sense other infected, split into two--the list goes on and on."

Top frowned.

"_I_ am one of those infected, and my power is the ability to _heal_." Chloe kicked at a small stone by her feet. "We, the _meteor freaks_, don't like to advertise our status because 99 of the mutated go power-crazy and have either been sent to Belle Reeve--a mental institution, have been _killed_, or have been kidnapped by Lionel Luthor and experimented on in the most inhumane of ways."

Charlie gasped, hand flying to her mouth.

Tyler narrowed his eyes. "Wait--_Lionel Luthor_? As in _Alexander Luthor's FATHER_?" When Chloe nodded he frowned deeper. "Does Luthor junior know what you can do?"

Chloe nodded again. "I discovered my power when I brought Lex back to life after his father shot him. Lex was the one who helped me gain control of my powers and learn to keep them hidden--although it can be hard because my hands glow when I heal others."

Tyler blinked and looked up, eyes widening. "You healed my rib!"

She nodded.

"Every time you touched me," Jack finally spoke, rubbing his fingers together. "The heat I felt--it was from your healing."

"I _had_ to heal you little by little." Chloe explained. "I'd have lit up like a Roman Candle if I'd done a full healing, and would have probably ended up in a semi-coma for a couple of hours."

"That explains it all. It explains _everything_." Jack looked up at her. "You're healing abilities are obviously stronger than the two different parasites inside of your body."

"_Two_ different--?" Charlie squeaked.

"Three hours--_three hours_ into the infestation--you should look just as shitty as I am." Jack laughed, but it wasn't a nice sound. "You're mutating--but you're _not_ at the same time. No _wonder_ the fucking bastards out there are so confused!"

"What does this have to do with the creature's sudden interest in Chloe?" Tyler asked.

"Don't you _get_ it?" Jack twirled on his brother. "These creatures were once men like _us_, probably somehow got trapped here when the church and half the mountainside collapsed. Remember the boots? Chloe said they were the style used by militants during the _Cold War_, which meant that these creatures were once _men_."

Everyone looked at Jack expectantly.

"Don't you _see?" _He growled at them. "Chloe's the first _female_ to be infected!"

"Oh _shit_!" The petite blonde cursed, taking a horrified step back.

"_That's_ why they're acting the way they are!" Jack continued on. "They can sense that she's infected! That's why they keep trying to take her and fight each other, they're trying to keep her with them until she mutates completely so they can _mate_!"

"Oh _God_, I'm gonna be sick." Chloe groaned, hand going to her mouth as she doubled over, bile rising up her throat.

Charlie was by her side in a second; hand on her back as Chloe retched.

"The thing is--three hours have passed and Chloe hasn't shown any signs of mutating. She looks just the same." Jack continued. "I don't think her healing faculties will let her mutate physically. Metabolically though? _Yes_, it's already happening, and that's what's confusing them."

"We need to get out of here." Chloe groaned as she ran the back of her sleeve over her mouth, still bent over, feeling sick. "Lex will know what to do, he'll help us--_both_ of us."

Charlie, Top and Tyler seemed to relax at the assurance in her voice.

Jack didn't, but he didn't say anything.

Chloe forced herself to straighten. "Let's get the hell out of here before another one of those things find us and decides it wants me and him to elope to Vegas."

* * *

They walked for what seemed like hours in complete silence, following Jack blindly, trusting him to lead the way and keep them safe. Chloe and Charlie still stuck together in the middle of the men as they seemed to go deeper into the cave system.

"It's getting cold." Tyler commented.

Charlie nodded her agreement, sparing him a quick look over her shoulder.

Chloe kept her eyes on Jack, worried as she noticed him continuing to transform little by little before her very eyes. His pupils had dilated to the point that he didn't need the light, and walked ahead of the group in the dark, able to see perfectly, and his skin as slowly changing color as streaks of brown darkened his pigmentation.

They finally came to a stop in the middle of an ice cavern. There was no way up, and the descent was steep on sheer _ice_.

"Where to now?" Tyler asked.

Jack crouched by the edge, listening, looking, _silent_. "Down."

Top and Tyler shared a look before shining their flashlights down the steep fall. "You sure?" The younger McAlister questioned.

Jack turned back to look at him and nodded. "Yeah. Down."

Top and Tyler shared _another_ look.

Suddenly the sound of a distant sonar cry caused everyone to turn jerk around.

"My lead!" Top announced quickly. "Let's go!"

"_Yeah_!" Tyler nodded his agreement, both men working quickly, all questions about Jack's decision gone.

They worked quickly and Top began to rappel downwards, securing a line for the others to join, as they stood up top, Charlie and Jack flashing their flashlights on the darkness above while Tyler eased down Top's rope and Chloe blamed herself for their being found so quickly. Obviously she was a tracking beacon of sorts for these crazed creatures, and unless they didn't get out of there quickly, she might be the death of her team.

"Safe! Off rope!" Top called. "Start climbing down!"

The rope wasn't nearly long enough to reach the bottom, so Top had gone to the lowest ledge and once they were all on that, they'd start the process all over again until they'd reached the ground.

Chloe was strapped into the unit and she slowly went down first, making it down on the ledge next to Top without any problem and with his help she moved aside and out of the way, leaning into the cold ice wall, telling herself not to look down at the black nothingness below them.

Charlie came down a lot quicker than Chloe did, and she slowly shuffled herself on the narrow ledge until she was standing next to Chloe as Tyler began the descent, the diving equipment attached to a buckle at his hip.

"Isn't this fun?" Charlie asked in a breathless voice, obviously trying to keep Chloe's mind off of the fact that they were standing on a narrow ledge above an endless nothing.

"Yes, absolutely _thrilling_." Chloe closed her eyes tightly. "We'll have to do this again next summer."

Charlie chuckled. "I don't know, I was planning on visiting Hawaii for our next vacation."

"Sounds peachy to _me_." Chloe muttered, breathing in an out.

The next thing that happened, happened so fast that later on when Chloe tried to remember it she was left dizzy and confused.

Tyler cried out in pain as he slipped on the ice and twirled around, banging hard into the wall, the collision causing the buckle holding the diving equipment up to _break_, sending the bundled equipment flying down at them at break-neck speed.

"TAKE COVER!" Tyler screamed as the equipment smashed into Top, sending him flying off of the wall of ice, sliding down the slick formation at break-neck speed, screaming. "_Shit!_"

"_TOP!_" Charlie screamed, shuffling quickly towards the discarded rope on the ledge and quickly harnessed herself, shoving a hook in a crevice in the ice, and rappelling as quickly down the ice as she could.

Tyler's feet landed on the ledge and he quickly transferred himself to the other rope. "I'm coming Top!"

Chloe watched with wide eyes, the sound of Top screaming echoing off the cavern's wall. She barely noticed as Jack arrived on the ledge. Somehow they made it to the bottom in one piece and found Top surrounded by Charlie and Tyler, holding his leg and trying to keep back screams as his bone stuck out of the material of his pants.

"I'm so sorry man!" Tyler kept on repeating. "I'm so sorry!"

Charlie looked up at Chloe, her brown eyes pleading with her. "Can you help him?"

Chloe nodded and pulled off her backpack and helmet, kneeling next to the injured man holding his leg and gritting his teeth in pain. "I'm not going to lie to you." She told him, eyeing the bone, which had broken clean from his flesh. "This is going to hurt, _a lot_." Without allowing him to process what she was saying, Chloe reached and quickly pressed down on the bone as hard as she could, her hands lighting up immediately as she activated her healing power, trying to ignore the screams coming from Top, whom Tyler and Jack had to grab to keep still.

The glow continued its way up her arm as she pushed down further, feeling the heat, feeling the bone reconnect with its other half and begin to mold itself together once more, feeling something different in her body, feeling it surging inside of her, threatening to take control as she found herself unable to stop the power flowing out of her body.

The bone, now fully mended, began to become covered once more as Top's skin regenerated before their very eyes, the sight of it drawing everyone's attention, and they didn't notice the way Chloe's body shook, and if they did, they didn't realize that the way she was jerking _wasn't_ normal.

Suddenly the thing within her _snapped_, and Chloe was able to stop the power flow with a gasp, pulling away from Top and collapsing on the cold floor, closing her eyes and taking in deep gulps of air, trying to stabilize the maddening rush of her heart.

"_Amazing_…" Charlie whispered.

Chloe forced her eyes open and turned to look at Top, who was lying down besides her. "I'm sorry, I didn't have the energy for a full heal. You'll still find it hard to walk on that leg." She tried to slow down her breathing. "It's fixed, but it'll be sore as _hell_ for days."

Top turned his head to look at her and he suddenly closed his eyes and _laughed_.

Soon the rest of them followed in the laughter before the two on the ground were helped to their feet, Top wincing in pain when he tried to put his whole weight on his leg. "Well, it was worth a shot."

Tyler grinned and Jack looked mildly amused as they both helped Top, as the girls followed behind as they made their way towards the large hole in the ice wall.

"Looks like the rebreather punched a hole through the ice." Tyler announced as they paused next to the opening.

"Yeah." Top agreed.

Making sure that Tyler had Top securely held, Jack let go and went to the hole cautiously, taking in a whiff of the steam coming from within. "Smells like _methane_."

Charlie and Chloe exchanged looks before following the men inside, walking through the rising steam and discovering that not only was it very _warm_ inside of this cavern, but that there wasn't any ice, and actually, small methane fires lit small sections of the room, which was filled with gigantic stalagmites, stalactites, and in the middle, down below, there was a large body of water.

They made their way slowly down the treacherous path, nearly slipping once or twice on the humid rocks, before finding themselves facing a _graveyard_ of skeletal remains of both human and _un-human_, spears and human skeletons still wearing their ancient armor greeted them the closer they got towards the water.

"This was some kind of killing ground." Top announced as they stopped the procession to get a better look of the massacred remains.

"It's just like the legend on the mosaics we found." Chloe whispered, remembering the pictures of the mosaics in question she had in a water proof plastic container in her bag. "This is where the Templars met their end at the hands of the demons that forced the clergy to seal up the cave."

"That means that there's got to be an opening close by." Jack announced, turning his back on the remains and heading towards the water.

Tyler helped Top down a slippery patch of stones, but when the two men _slid_, Charlie hurried up front with them to help them.

Chloe remained behind, shinning her light on the rocks around her, searching, _looking_. It _had_ to be here! The scrolls had been true up till this point, they were in the _mouth of hell_, so the thing she was seeking--the thing that'd she'd braved her fears for--it _had_ to be here!

_Come on, come on!_ She shone her light around furiously, narrowing her eyes, trying to find the insignia.

And suddenly something hidden in a crevice behind the skeletal remains of a Templar shone when it caught the light of the flashlight, and Chloe gulped, going closer to inspect it, wincing when bones cracked loudly under her feet.

_Don't think about the fact that you're stepping on dead people!_

Chloe groaned slightly as she pushed the skeleton away from the crevice and shone her light inside of it, seeing the light being reflected brighter.

_I'm going to stick my hand in a dark crevice in the middle of a demon-infested lair. This is SO horror-Hollywood!_

Closing her eyes tightly, Chloe stuck her hands inside of the crevice and felt along the dampness until her fingers came into contact with something that sent a jolt of electricity through her body and down her spine. The blonde controlled the urge to pull away and instead wrapped her hand around the object, pulling it out and opening her eyes, a sudden smile lighting her face as she stared down at a Kryptonian crystal, baring the insignia of the House of EL, in her hands.

_I can't believe it._ She stared down at the beautiful crystal, not realizing that she wasn't tired anymore from having healed Top. _It's real--I found it_!

"_CHLOE_?"

"Coming!" She quickly pulled off her backpack and opened it, grabbing a cloth and wrapping it around the crystal protectively before putting it in her backpack and closing it before putting it on her shoulder and hurrying down the slippery path, sliding passed the large rock formation that'd hid her from the others' view.

Jack, Tyler, Top and Charlie were standing knee-deep in the water, smiling at each other brightly as they looked at the water bubbling up in the middle of the cavern.

"We found our way out!" Charlie exclaimed in happiness.

"Where?" Chloe asked, entering the water rapidly.

"You see the light?" Jack shined his flashlight on the bubbling water.

"Yeah." Chloe nodded.

"There's cold water coming up, _that_ is our way out." He kept his gaze on the bubbling water. "It must have been a dry passage once."

Suddenly Jack doubled over in mute pain.

"_Jack_?" Tyler asked with worry, this was the first time they'd seen one of his attacks.

"Help him to the shore!" Chloe ordered as Jack nearly collapsed into the water from the magnitude of the pain as his body jerked violently.

"What's happening?" Tyler asked as he hurried Jack to the shore, helping him sit down. "Talk to me, Jack!"

Jack's eyes were wide, his pupils _barely visible_ as his body shook and he seemed on the verge of collapsing.

"_Jack_!" Charlie called from where she remained in the water, helping Top keep upright. "_What's going on?!_"

Chloe knelt down next to Tyler and in a move that surprised _everyone_, she reached for the knife Jack kept attached to his belt and pulled it out, slicing her wrist and pressing the bleeding wound to his mouth.

"What the _hell_ are you _doing_?" Tyler exclaimed, turning to look at her in horror.

"_I'm saving your brother's life!_" She snapped, never taking her eyes off of Jack. "Come on Jack, come _on_!" She pressed the wound harder against his mouth, forcing her bleeding wrist slightly _into_ his mouth, her blood falling within. "If Jack's theory is correct, the antibodies for this mutation are in my body—in my _blood_." She winced when instincts took over and Jack sucked hard on her wrist, drawing the blood from her already closing wound into his mouth like a starved creature.

Then again, if she didn't find a way to slow and _stop_ the mutation, that was exactly what he would become.

Jack's shaking _stopped_, and he groaned, placing his hand over hers and sucking softer on the wound, a near _purr_ echoing in the back of his throat.

Chloe gulped, looking away from his expression of ecstasy, feeling a _lot_ embarrassed now that the danger apparently had passed. Her blood had seemed to stop any further mutation, and she didn't think that it was wishful thinking on her part that Jack was looking better.

"He's not so pale anymore." Charlie observed as she and Top finally made it to their side.

The wound in her wrist closed up completely, and Jack's tongue scraped across the soft skin before he pulled away, opening his eyes.

Charlie gasped. "His eyes!"

Chloe blinked. The pupils were slowly morphing from their four-point star shape to a feline-like _oval_, which was really quite an improvement considering that an oval was _much_ closer to their original shape.

"You guys are getting out of here and I'm going back for the others." Jack tried to stand, but he swayed on his feet and if it hadn't been for Tyler's quick reflexes, he would have fallen.

"What are you talking about, man?" Tyler exclaimed, easing his brother back down so that he was sitting. "You're in _no_ condition to be going back out there. Top can barely walk. _I'm_ going back."

"Put your gear on and get in the water." Jack ordered.

"I'm not getting into the water." Tyler narrowed his eyes. "And _you're_ not going back." He moved to leave.

Jack tried to charge after him but he was too weak, and Chloe's hand on his chest was enough to push him back down into a sitting position.

"Sit _down_, Jack!" She snapped, glaring at him. "Tyler's right. You're in no condition to go."

"I'm not letting my little brother go there alone!" Jack growled at her.

"He's _not_." She gulped, standing. "I'm going with him."

"Now wait here a _second_--!" Tyler and Jack both exclaimed at the same time.

"_No_." She snapped, silencing them. "Tyler can't go alone, and there's no other option. Yes, I'm a beacon for the creatures right now, but you said so yourself, I'm developing the heightened senses, I can _help_ Tyler. Charlie needs to stay here with you and Top, both of you are sore--and Jack, you'll be weak from my blood fighting whatever is in _yours_, you two wouldn't be any good to help me if something followed my signal into here."

Charlie gulped.

"It's safer for _all_ of us if Tyler and I go for Kathryn and the others." Chloe pressed. "And if there's anyone injured, I can heal them enough to get them here. It's a win/win situation."

"She's right Jack." Top said softly from where he was resting against a boulder.

"But--."

"No, Jack." Tyler cut into his brother, obviously having been won over by Chloe's argument. "You led us here, you were right. Now let _us_ do this. We _can_ do it."

Jack looked at them both, torn, before nodding.

Chloe and Tyler exchanged looks and turned to leave.

"Wait!" Charlie hurried forwards and hugged them both tightly. "Come back in one piece."

Tyler smiled down at her. "Promise." He then turned to Chloe. "You ready to do this?"

Taking in a deep breath, Chloe nodded.

* * *

Okay! That's the end of this chapter! Chloe is slowly getting more sure of herself and less frightened, and she's being able to be a more active part of the group by acting like the 'nurse'. And….hmmmm….what will happen in the NEXT chapter?

**REVIEW!**


	6. Chapter 6

**Disclaimer: I do not own Smallville or The Cave or any characters mentioned in either. I, unfortunately, also don't own Lex Luthor (Michael Rosenbaum would be more than sufficient), Jack McAlister, OR Tyler McAlister either. Shucks. My life SUCKS man! **

_Heya everyone! I'm back with the new update, just like always! I'm really glad that people are enjoying this story so much! I have to say, this is probably one of the stories I have most enjoyed writing! I've also really enjoyed writing this chapter since it's one of the two parts I really wanted to write when I decided to do this story (the next part hasn't happened yet). I hope you enjoy this as much as you have previous chapters!_

* * *

The climb back up the ice wall was hard, but Chloe felt that strange heat warming her muscles, and slowly she began to find that she was getting stronger. Still, it was a long way up to the top, but when they finally made it Chloe and Tyler smiled at each other in pride, taking in deep breaths before hurrying back the way they'd come, mindful of their surroundings as to not get lost or get snuck upon.

Tyler carried his backpack and diving equipment but Chloe had left her equipment and everything in the cavern with Jack and the others, not needing it to hold her back. She'd felt a little worried about separating herself from the Kryptonian crystal now that she'd found it, but she knew that the weight of the backpack would only slow her down.

Running through a dark passage, following Tyler as he tried to backtrack where Jack had brought them through, Chloe froze when she felt something behind her. Turning, Chloe narrowed her eyes when she saw nothing in the darkness surrounding her, she'd been so _sure_…

The sound of a growl somewhere in the cavern that interconnected with the one they were now in caused Tyler to turn as well. "_Shit_! Chloe!"

Turning back to the other man, Chloe took off as fast as her feet could take her, with his running by her side, grabbing onto her hand and pulling her behind him as his longer feet took him faster. She bit back a scream when suddenly the tunnel opened up to _nothing_, and they were falling…_falling_…into the water far below.

With a kick of their feet they'd surfaced, and Chloe gulped in air as both she and Tyler pulled on the goggles they'd been wearing around their necks, took in a deep breath, and dove right under the water once more, knowing that the creature could have picked up on Chloe and be behind them.

The dive took them under, and Chloe tried holding her breath for as long as she could in between 'buddy breaths', as both she and Tyler shared the oxygen in the oxygen tank between them. Chloe didn't know how Tyler could be so sure of where they were going, but she trusted him, and when the light of his flashlight shone on a discarded piece of equipment in the underwater tunnel that they were swimming in, she turned to him and smiled, realizing that they really_ were_ going in the right direction.

They finally squeezed out of the narrowing tunnel and surfaced, taking in deep breaths of air and swimming to the shore, eyes narrowing as the beam from Tyler's light landed upon all of the equipment Kathryn, Briggs and Alex had taken with them. The backpacks and diving gear had been discarded rapidly, and Chloe sniffed, wondering what the metallic scent in the air was.

"What--what's that _scent_?"

"What scent?" Tyler turned to her, frowning.

"I--I don't _know_." Chloe sniffed the air, stepping onto the shore and following the scent until she was standing amongst the discarded equipment. She turned right, inhaled, shook her head and then turned to the left and did the same, pausing, walking towards the left, following the pungent scent, and gasping in horror as she stood in front of one of the backpacks, but the difference with this one was that it was splattered with _blood_.

"_KATHRYN!_" She screamed, looking around. "ALEX?!"

Tyler was by her side in a second, light shinning down on the blood-stained backpack, going pale. "That blood's fresh."

"_KIM!_ _KATHRYN_!"

They looked up, gasping as they heard Briggs' voice screaming somewhere in the tunnel system in front of them.

"_Briggs_." Tyler whispered before taking off rapidly in the direction of the screams, and Chloe followed him because while she'd never liked Briggs, she didn't want him _dead_, and he sounded like he was in a lot of trouble. The blonde tripped and went down, the distance expanding between her and Tyler, and as she tried to get up she bit back a cry at the pain in her ankle.

Of all the times to sprain it!

"_Briggs! Briggs!_" Tyler's voice resounded long after he'd disappeared from her view.

"_HELP!_" Briggs' voice screamed.

_Come on, come on, come on!_ Chloe knew that she couldn't accelerate the healing process more than it already was--her foot seemed almost on _fire_ from the strength of the healing--but she felt so _useless_ lying on the floor when she should be helping Tyler.

"_Briggs!"_

"_HELP ME TYLER!"_ The terror in Briggs' voice, mounted with the sound of something growling and bones cracking, echoed off the walls of the tunnel. "_HELP ME!_"

"_Hold onto me Briggs!_"

"_Don't let go_!" Briggs begged. "_Please—oh--God! TYLER!_ NOO!"

"_Shit!_" Tyler cursed. "_Hold on Briggs! I'm coming_!"

_Come on—come on—come—yes!_ The heat in her foot suddenly vanished and Chloe got to her feet and hurried down the tunnel, shining her light around her desperately, trying to find Tyler. "_Tyler_?" She continued to run, knowing there was a creature in here that had Briggs and that Tyler was after it, knowing that there were probably more creatures lurking around in the dark and she had no weapon.

_Tyler, where ARE you?_

She halted when that same metallic scent, the one she now knew was _blood_, hit her so strongly she threw her head back and groaned, for the first time sensing the aroma _beneath_ the metallic one, the _hidden_ aroma that _enticed_ her to follow its scent until she came across a dark crevice in the cavern's wall, a dark crevice that reeked of _blood._ That ambrosia rose into her nostrils, causing Chloe to tremble as her hand slowly trailed through the pool of thick red liquid.

The blonde pulled back her hand, examining her blood-coated fingers before bringing them to her nose and inhaling, eyelids falling shut, a moan of pleasure gurgling in her throat, feeling something _shift_ inside of her, something feral, something primeval, something _predatory_.

Chloe's eyes flew open and she blinked, suddenly seeing the dark tunnel as easily as if a million torches had been lit. She narrowed her eyes in confusion and slight suspicion, killing the beam of her flashlight and blinking as the tunnel seemed to lit up even **brighter**, and she could see every little crevice, every nook and cranny.

_The smell of the blood must have triggered something inside of me_.

She wiped the blood off of her fingers and looked down at her arms in near panic. Seeing them normal she brought her hands to her face, feeling no mutation, her body was warm to the touch and her skin was still pink with health.

But something felt _different_.

_So, what exactly happened to me_?

Seeing something moving in the darkness of the cave before her, Chloe acted on instinct and swung behind a ledge, peeking out from behind it and bringing a hand to her mouth to silence her gasp as she saw the large creature walking down the tunnel-system in her direction.

It paused, tilted its blind head to the side, and opened its mouth.

Guessing it's intent, Chloe swung back behind the protective barrier of the ledge in time to escape the sonar call, which bounced off of the ledge and returned the image of an empty tunnel to the creature. It seemed satisfied and walked right _passed_ Chloe, pausing and raising its nose to the air, _sniffing_.

For a moment she was horrified that it'd caught a whiff of her scent, and terror kept her frozen when it turned around and headed back in her direction, but right before it could touch her, the creature turned and stuck it's head into the crevice filled with blood and took in a deep whiff. It made a gurgling sound in the back of it's throat before surging forwards, squeezing its massive girth and length into the narrow opening and disappearing into the darkness within.

_It didn't sense me_. Chloe's mind worked a million miles a second. _I'm not a beacon anymore._ A small smile lit up her face. _Whatever just happened to me, whatever it is, it's turned off their homing ability--or I've just stopped transmitting the signal--or--or--who really GIVES a damn HOW it happened? THEY CAN'T SENSE ME ANYMORE!_

Long after the sound of shuffling and sniffing had died away into nothingness, Chloe breathed a sigh of relief and hurried back on her journey, trying to find Tyler and the others. She knew that time was of the essence, and the fact that she and the dark-haired McAlister had been separated this long didn't bode well with her. Together they were stronger, alone they were easy targets--Tyler the easiest thanks to the fact that he didn't have the increasingly _useful_ abilities being infected gave Chloe.

The blonde paused when she reached a fork in the road, looking from one tunnel to the other, wondering which she should take.

A scream echoed throughout the cavern followed by the sound of a thundering roar.

_Kathryn_…

Chloe strained her hearing to figure out from _which_ tunnel the scientist's screams were echoing from, and making a decision she darted into the right sub-division, praying she'd made the right choice, praying that the reason that there were no more screams was because Kathryn had somehow gotten away and _not_ because she was being eaten.

Taking the corner rapidly, Chloe cried out and dodged the rock flying at her, looking up in surprise to see Kathryn kneeling on the ground, sonar gun in hand, looking up at her with wide, unbelieving eyes.

"_Chloe_?" Her voice was small and broken. "Is that really you?"

"Kathryn!" Chloe hurried towards her and dropped to her knees, hugging the trembling older woman. "Are you okay? Are you hurt? Where are the others?"

"_Chloe!_" Kathryn hugged her back fiercely, crying desperate tears. "I can't believe it's you--I thought it was that monster coming to get me again!"

Chloe pulled away slightly and looked around her at that, satisfied when she didn't see a sign of the creature. "How did you get it to leave in the first place?"

"Sound waves." Kathryn replied, wiping furiously at her tears as she raised the sonar gun. "They retreat from the pulse--I think it disorients them, leaves them momentarily blind or something, I'm not sure, but whatever it is it isn't permanent. They keep coming back."

"Which means that we've got to get out of here." Chloe stood and pulled her along with her. "Jack found a way out." She began to drag Kathryn back in the direction that she'd come from. "Where's Alex?"

"I—I don't know." Kathryn admitted, still shaky. "We'd just gotten out of the water when one of them _attacked. _We all ran and got separated I—Chloe--."

She turned to look at the scientist and frowned when Kathryn gasped, eyes widening. "What?"

"Your _eyes_, _Chloe_! They're _gold!_" Kathryn slowly removed her hand from her mouth and hesitantly pressed her fingers to the skin close to Chloe's eyes. "You're infected."

Chloe tensed, unsure of how Kathryn would react to this news.

"It happened above the falls, didn't?" Seeing Chloe nod, Kathryn took in a deep breath and closed her eyes for a second. "No wonder you went with Jack. Chloe—about what I said--I--."

She was apologizing.

Chloe smiled slightly at her. "Kathryn, we're stuck underground with some _really_ ugly things wanting to eat us, I think we can wait for this until we're above ground, right?"

Kathryn's face lit with a grin. "Right."

"Good." Chloe gave her hand a tug. "Come on, the water's _this_ way."

They ran down the tunnel in silence until they reached the water. Chloe and Kathryn hurriedly put on the diving equipment and hurried into the water, diving under right before a creature burst from the tunnel behind them. With each kick of their fins, the two women dove deeper into the underwater passage, and it took all of Chloe's concentration to remember which of the various tunnels she'd gone through with Tyler.

Once or twice she nearly went down the wrong one, but Kathryn, who'd also taken the dive anyway, pointed out the right path, and they seemed like they were going to make it when Chloe froze in mid-stroke, outstretching her arm and causing Kathryn to collide with it.

"What--?" Kathryn spoke into the mic.

Before she could tell Kathryn to hide behind something it was too late, the vibrations of the sonar call ripped through her like miniature _waves_, and the creature that was still too far away to be able to seen with a flashlight's beam was heading towards them.

"Turn back _now_!"

But just as Kathryn was doing as told sonar waves blasted Chloe from behind, and her heart nearly stopped beating in terror as she realized that they were trapped in that passageway with two monsters on each side, zooming in on them.

"Look for another way out!"

Kathryn couldn't see the danger, but she obviously trusted Chloe because she looked around frantically, shinning the beam of her flashlight all around her. "There!"

"Get in!" Chloe swam behind the dark haired woman, pushing her up the tiny, extremely narrow crevice, wincing when she heard the sound of Kathryn's oxygen tank scraping against the walls of the crevice. The blonde kept looking back, tracking the rapidly approaching predators. "Hurry!"

Kathryn finally slipped inside completely and Chloe dashed in as well, turning her body slightly so her oxygen tank wouldn't scrape against the wall of the crevice, and she grabbed onto the rocks, _pulling_ her body through, like Kathryn was doing a little above her.

They screamed as the crevice shook, and Chloe looked down to see the creatures ramming into the opening, unable to squeeze through because of their large bulk. They extended their claw-filled hands inside and took swings at her fin, but thank _god_ she was out of their reach.

"There's an opening ahead." Kathryn's voice drifted to her.

"Let's hope we don't have any neighbors." Chloe whispered as Kathryn's body emerged from the crevice and she followed, motioning with her thumbs to surface when she realized that there was shore.

Halfway to the surface Chloe's oxygen gave out, and she quickly pulled off the straps and let the empty container sink to the bottom of the water-filled cavern before kicking as fast as she could and quickly surfaced, gasping for breath as she tugged the goggles off and began swimming towards the shore, Kathryn behind her.

They made it to the shore and took off their fins, their bare feet touching the floor, which was unusually _cold_.

Chloe frowned as she looked up and around, realizing that the walls were covered in _ice_.

_We must have swam a route closer to where Jack and the others are_!

"Why'd you get rid of your oxygen tank?" Kathryn asked, shaking slightly with cold.

"Ran out of air." Chloe looked around her, trying to figure out where to go from here and not coming up with a solution. They might have escaped the creatures that's been trailing them, but they were now completely _lost_.

Suddenly the sound of rocks tumbling caused them to jerk around and Kathryn went to her knees immediately, fumbling in her backpack and pulling out the sonar gun she'd packed there before entering the water. The scientist aimed it with shaking hands at the iceberg that divided the next cavern into to two separate units.

The sound of something hurrying in their direction caused Kathryn to back up, and she _whimpered_ when a distorted shadow could be seen coming towards them.

Suddenly something shot out from behind the iceberg and Kathryn pulled the trigger on the sonar gun, eyes wide when she realized _what_, or _who_ it was she was aiming it at.

"Tyler!" Chloe cried, hurrying towards the man and hugging him tightly, giving him a quick kiss on his cheek with utter _relief_ before doing the same to the shaky oriental next to him. "_Alex_!"

"Your _eyes_…" Tyler whispered, looking at her in shock when she pulled away.

Oh, yeah, she'd forgotten about that.

"Where's Briggs?" Kathryn asked in a shaky voice, sonar gun still aimed at them.

Tyler tore his gaze from Chloe's face and turned to look at Kathryn, his grim expression saying it all.

"We gotta go," Alex cut in, looking behind him in fear. "They're coming this way."

"Look, we can't go back in the water, there's only one way out and it's guarded by two of those things." Chloe stated.

Alex froze, he'd been about to go in.

Tyler walked passed Chloe and went to the other side of the iceberg, shinning his light above them at the ice. "The way out's next to an ice vein." He continued to examine it. "This _has_ to connect."

Chloe breathed out a sigh of relief now that she wasn't the one in charge anymore.

The sound of sonar calls echoed from the passage that Tyler and Alex had just come from.

Everyone shared frightened looks.

"Come on," Tyler ordered. "Let's go."

* * *

Lex Luthor continued to look out of the window on his private jet and tap his foot incessantly against the floor. He knew that there was no logical reason for him to feel like this, but he was, and he _knew_ that there was something wrong with Chloe. During their many years of friendship he'd acquired a certain _second sense_ when it came to the trouble-finding blonde, and that ability had only _heightened_ after she'd discovered her meteor powers by bringing him back to life after his father had killed him.

Lex hadn't understood his ability to _feel_ Chloe in until a couple of months ago when he'd realized that it was because he was Chloe's _first_--not, well, not _intimately_, but he _was_ the first person she'd used her powers on, and he'd gotten hit with a _whole lot_ of pent up, _pure_ power. That, also coupled with the fact that he was quite positive the meteor rocks had had some _other_ passive affect on him other than the loss of his hair--well--it'd created a _connection_ between him and the blonde, and he knew, he _knew_ she was in trouble.

That was why he'd left a very important meeting just to call Lois and see if she could locate the suddenly absent Clark. If there was anyone who would know where Clark was, it was Chloe's somewhat annoying cousin. How the woman could bring down entire corporations by her sleuthing abilities and yet not realize that the guy she spent most of her time with was _pathetically_ in love with her was a mystery to the billionaire.

"I _hate_ flying." Lois Lane muttered drunkenly as she clutched the whole bottle of wine to her heart as if she could somehow use it as a floating device in case they crashed. "I just _hate_ it! At least when flying with Smallville I know _he's_ not going to crash and kill me, and he's damned more comfortable than these seats." She shifted in said seats. "Damned expensive and yet it _still_ hurts my back!"

Lex raised an eyebrow as the ridiculously drunk woman spilled that little secret. So Clark had taken her out flying? The poor boy, he was using all of his aces and yet _still_ Lois was completely _oblivious_. No _wonder_ the boy had taken sick leave and gone to the Fortress! He was probably frustrated as _hell_!

Pressing a button, Lex motioned the stewardess over when she appeared. "How much longer till we land?"

"Around an hour, sir." The stewardess bent over, her cleavage suddenly leveled with his face. "Is there anything you would like me to do for you in the meanwhile?" She batted her eyelashes at him, and while she was admittedly very attractive, Lex waved her away, looking back out of the window, praying that an hour wouldn't be an hour too late.

"_Skank_." Lois muttered from where she sat as the stewardess huffed and stormed away.

Lex couldn't help it, despite everything, despite his worry, a corner of his lips curled in a smirk.

* * *

The trek back was arduous and grueling, and Chloe couldn't remember half of it. All she remembered was the smell of ice and fear, and the feeling of cold, and the pain in her feet as both she and Kathryn were continuing the rest of the journey without any shoes on, as they'd accidentally left them behind.

Somehow they found themselves in the cavern, the sounds of sonar cries betraying the fact that while they'd been gone, the creatures had infiltrated the room. The humans kept silent, making their down slowly down, hoping not to catch the attention of the creatures who hung upside-down from the cave's roof.

"Where are the others?" Alex asked in a hiss.

"They got to be here _somewhere_." Tyler answered, trying to find his brother, Top and Charlie.

"But _where_?" Kathryn asked, bending to her knees and shinning her flashlight down below.

The sound of sonar calls echoed throughout the cavern.

Chloe turned when she heard movement behind her, and her defensive stance relaxed immediately as she saw Jack heading towards them, carrying the equipment, with Charlie helping Top along behind.

"Guys!" Tyler exclaimed in relief.

"_Quiet_." Jack intoned, reaching the group. "Kill your light."

The group did as told, and the cavern lit up brighter for Chloe.

"What happened to you?" Kathryn asked Top when she saw him leaning so heavily on Charlie.

"An accident." Was the only thing the dark man answered as they all huddled in a circled together, Top sitting down and resting his back against a rock, obviously relieved to be off his feet.

"Where's Briggs?" Jack asked, bent to his knees like the rest of them.

Tyler looked down at his feet. "He didn't make it."

Jack looked down with pain and sighed, shaking his head, before looking up when the next sonar cry was much closer than the last had been. "They're watching us. They see with sound, and the steam? It's confusing them." His gaze remained on the creatures. "They took one of our rebreathers, but they've left us alone since."

"Jack says that they're playing with us." Charlie intoned, speaking for the first time since they'd all joined up once more.

"They're waiting on something." Jack was worried.

"There were more of them behind us." Tyler remembered, looking back at the way they'd come.

"We should get in the water, _now_." Jack announced just as the sound of roaring came from the tunnel above.

"Look," Kathryn pulled out the sonar gun and placed it in the middle of the group. "This works for a while. The sonars clash and confuses them, it'll buy us time."

"Which is something we could do with." Charlie whispered.

"We have to split out those tanks, the air and the oxygen." Tyler turned to Top, who nodded and began doing so. "It's not going to last long, but it's our only choice."

"We need the other rebreather, Tyler." Jack announced, standing and peeking out from behind a pillar of stone, Chloe and Tyler behind him in a second, looking in the direction he was pointing in at the rebreather, which had been seemingly discarded above on one of the pillars. "You see it there?"

"Yeah." Tyler nodded.

"I'm going to go for it." Jack told him, not taking his eyes from the rebreather. "You get the rest of them into the water."

Tyler turned and looked at his brother in silence for a moment before nodding. "Okay."

Chloe glared at Tyler's back as he left to do as commanded, before turning to Jack. "You can't be _serious_ Jack! We _both_ know it's a trap!"

He turned to look at her, mouth open to speak, when he suddenly noticed her eyes for the first time and his mouth shut firmly as his eyes darkened and his pupils immediately morphed from their oval shape to that of the four-point star.

Chloe's eyes widened as she took a cautious step back.

Jack closed his eyes tightly, a muscle in his cheek throbbing as he looked away quickly. "Just--just go--_now_!"

She turned and rushed back to where the others were, Tyler issuing commands.

"All right, Top, start breaking down that unit."

"Already on it, Tyler."

"Good." Tyler nodded. "Kathryn, you, Alex and Chloe will have to buddy-breathe from the same air tank. Top, Charlie, that'll leave you two with the oxygen...no regulator."

"Cool." Top nodded that he could take it.

"What's life without risk?" Charlie shrugged her consent.

Chloe felt Jack's gaze on her back but she didn't dare look at him, frightened at how she'd been able to undo the progress she'd made in him so far. Just one look at her predator's eyes and he'd lost it, morphing, and she'd recognized the look in those four-point star eyes.

The blonde hugged her backpack to her, knowing that the crystal was safe…and that was the reason of this particular parasite, wasn't it? To safeguard the crystal? Anyone who'd come here would either be killed by the guardians of the crystal--or they'd turned _into_ them, assuring the fact that no one would be able to leave here alive, and with the crystal in their possession.

She heard the sound of footsteps going away from the group and closed her eyes, knowing that Jack was setting off for what could only be called a suicide mission.

"_Jack_!" Kathryn's voice stopped him. "I'm sorry."

There was a moment's pause before the footsteps were heard again, and Chloe took in a deep, calming breath, preparing herself mentally for what she knew was going to happen. They were going to have the last confrontation, like the Templar's, and she hoped to _God_ that their story ended differently.

"You know," Kathryn whispered to Chloe. "When I said I'd give my life for science--I didn't mean it like _this_."

She turned to look at the older woman. "I know."

"I'll cover you with the mapping gun." Alex told Tyler, reaching for the sonar gun.

"All right." Tyler nodded, passing everyone their things. "Let's go. Let's get out of here."

Kathryn and Tyler led the way down towards the water, with Chloe and Charlie helping Top, and Alex in the back, eyes above on the creatures, their sonar cries echoing off of the cavern, trying to find the humans below. The small group kept low, using the steam as coverage, inching closer and closer to the water, praying that they would be able to make it.

Chloe wished that she could say that she put her whole attention on the task at hand but it would have been a lie, because her gaze kept shooting to where Jack made his slow advance on the other side of the cavern, eyes on the creatures above, making his way to the pillar in which the rebreather was caught.

Charlie and Chloe slowly helped Top down a slippery boulder and felt hope rising in at them as they neared the water, when Alex slid on the boulder behind them and fell, the sound attracting the attention of the creatures and giving away their location.

The creatures all turned towards them, swinging viciously from stalactite to stalactite, roaring as they advanced.

Alex raised the sonar gun at them and fired, the creatures shrieked in pain and backed up.

"Into the water! Now!" Tyler yelled as they broke out into a desperate run towards the edge of the water, which was only a couple of feet away, Alex trailing behind as he continued to blast the sonar waves at the creatures as they continued to press on.

"ALEX!" Charlie screamed. "HURRY UP!"

The Asian let off another round of rapid, consecutive blasts before turning and running after them.

Suddenly there was a swooping sound and Alex was lifted up from the ground, screaming as the claws of the creature dug into his shoulders, drawing blood.

"_ALEX!_" Tyler screamed, running back onto the land as Chloe urged the rest of them deeper into the water before trying to hurry out of the water to try and help.

"You. Son. Of. A. _Bitch_!" Alex screamed, aiming the sonar gun at the creature that had him before activating it, the sonar causing the creature to shriek and throw him away violently, he fell the long distance to the ground and…impaled himself on a stalagmite below.

Chloe froze, still in the water, mouth open in a mute scream as Alex's blood spurted everywhere. She collapsed to her knees, the water reaching her to her upper chest.

Tyler tripped and fell to the ground, looking up in horror at the body of Alex before one of the creatures swooped down again and grabbed it, pulling it from the stalagmite and carrying it off into the distance to feast, a couple of the beasts hurrying after it for its kill.

"_NO!_" Charlie screamed.

A growl from the water caused Chloe to turn, seeing a large creature threading the water, going towards Top, Charlie and Kathryn, who'd seen it as well and submerged themselves under until their heads were the only thing left above water. They hid behind the stalagmites sticking out from the water, but the creature had gotten a lock on them and was heading in their direction.

As it neared them the three adults submerged themselves completely under the water, and Chloe looked around her desperately, trying to find something to use as a weapon, and coming up with nothing.

The creature was now standing amongst them, still, silent, not even blinking, sending sonar cries into the water and growling with slow impatience as it rebounding back to him as nothing. And yet still it stayed there, not moving an inch, its chest moving in and out as it breathed, as it listened, and suddenly Chloe realized what it was doing.

It knew that the humans were below the water somewhere around it and despite the fact that it could easily submerge itself and find them it wasn't going to do that, it was playing a deadly game of cat and mouse--waiting for the first one who ran out of oxygen and needed to surface for air.

Chloe opened her mouth to scream, to attract its attention, when Kathryn shot out of the water, gasping for air, and the creature roared, opening its mouth and biting down on her head, its teeth piercing her forehead, the sound of her skull breaking echoing off the walls of the cavern as the creature took to the air with its prey, and Kathryn's dead eyes haunted Chloe as she tried to scream, but no sound would come out of her mouth.

Charlie and Top surfaced with greedy gasps of air, looking around them and then up at the ceiling of the cave, watching as the creature flew away with Kathryn's limp body.

Chloe jumped when she heard water splashing in front of her, and she looked up, feeling _numb_ as she saw a grief-stricken Tyler trudging through the water towards her.

"_Kathryn_--." Chloe managed to croak out the name.

Tyler closed his eyes for a second in pain. "I know."

"Jacks right—they're all playing games with us." Charlie whimpered, tears causing her eyes to become shiny. "It could have been any of us—it was almost me--I--."

A roar echoed throughout the cavern and they all turned to see Jack climbing up the pillar, a creature hot on his trail.

"_JACK_!" Tyler yelled as Jack finally made it to the ledge on the pillar that the rebreather was stationed on.

The elder McAlister ignored the sound of his brother screaming his name and reached for the knife he had strapped to his belt. Pulling it out of the buckle he twirled around just as the creature made it to the ledge and _pounced_--stabbing it right between its eyes.

The creature screamed as Jack pulled the knife out and quickly repeated the gesture. It went limp and fell back, down, down, down into the deep water beneath, its body surfacing and floating motionlessly, bleeding.

Chloe let out a breath of relief.

A roar resounded throughout the cavern as the largest of the creatures Chloe had ever seen went charging towards the man.

"JACK!" Tyler screamed. "THERE'S ANOTHER ONE!"

Jack dropped the rebreather unit into the water. "GET OUT OF HERE!" Before he stood and tightened his grip on his knife, waiting for the creature.

And suddenly Chloe knew what he was doing.

Jack had led them all the way to safety--despite their murmurs and distrust--and yet he'd never planed on leaving himself. He'd planned on staying behind, on dying here if need be.

She narrowed her eyes as the creature charged towards the lone man, she'd lost _too many_ friends on this expedition and she wasn't going to lose another! Not like this! "Start diving."

"Huh?" Top turned to her in confusion.

She ignored the question and screamed, she screamed as loud as she could, and like every other time she'd screamed, the creature responded. It froze, skidding to a halt before it could reach Jack, turning, scanning the cave nearly _frantically_.

"CHLOE!" Jack yelled. "DON'T DO IT!"

She looked into his eyes before letting out yet _another_ scream, the sound of sonar echoes from the tunnel where the others had disappeared to feast announcing that they'd heard it too and were coming--the sounds of fighting and the tearing of flesh proving that they were fighting each other in the dark to get to the cavern first.

Tyler, realizing what was happening, turned to Charlie and Top. "Into the water! Now! Start diving!"

They obeyed him and the three dove under the surface of the water, heading towards the exit as the creature above took off, swinging from stalactite to stalactite, raising towards her at break-neck speed.

Jack cursed and dove off the pillar and into the deep water below.

Chloe tore her gaze from where he'd disappeared under the water and up at the creature coming at her, pushing away from the ceiling and pressing its wings to its side as it sky-dived towards her. At the last second Chloe gasped as something grabbed her from under the water and pulled her under.

She kicked as it dragged her further and further into the deeper water.

She felt the annoyed tug and stopped struggling, looking down and realizing that her captor was _Jack_.

Both surfaced when he let go of her.

"We're going to have a serious talk about that shit you just pulled." Jack glared at her, pulling out a small container from his belt and tossing it into a methane fire on the shore, causing it to explode. "_Later_." As the flame of the humongous explosion expanded, Jack grabbed Chloe's hand as they took in a deep breath and dove under.

Above them they could see explosions wrecking the places as the methane gas continued to explode, causing the pillars of rock to crumble and collapse into the water all around them. They held in their breaths as they dove through the underground passageway, just ahead of them they could see the their friends, backlit by the lit at the end of the tunnel, emerging from it.

The tunnel shook viciously, and began to give way, collapsing all around them.

Chloe felt dizzy from lack of oxygen, but she held on tightly to Jack as he swam with her, dodging falling rocks and heading towards the light of the opening, which grew larger and larger with each kick of their feet.

The second they emerged from the tunnel it collapsed completely, and yet Chloe didn't notice because the world was spinning all around her from lack of oxygen. She felt herself slipping, slipping from reality, and then suddenly they'd broken through the surface and she could breathe again.

Not only could she breathe, but she felt the cold air against her face and opened her eyes to see that they were in a large lake, in the middle of the Carpathian Mountains.

"We--we did it." Top whispered in awe. "We made it."

"HELL YES!" Charlie slapped the surface of the water with laughter and excitement.

"_Chloe, Jack_!" Tyler swam towards them, relief etched in his every feature. "You're okay!" He hugged them before pulling away and smiling, swimming back to the others. "We're alive! We're safe!"

"We're lost in the Carpathian Mountains." Charlie announce dryly, though there was a small smile on her face because of his enthusiasm. "And Top is _still_ injured, so I say we get the hell outta the water and try find our way back to the dig-site."

"I say we listen to her." Top smiled.

Tyler nodded, smile growing. "Yeah, I'm sick of the water anyway."

Despite everything, Jack smiled softly as he watched his brother. "We're still gonna have that talk." He told Chloe. "_Later_."

She grinned at him, glad to see that his eyes had returned to their oval shape. "Yeah, sure, _later_."

* * *

Apparently now that she didn't need the ability to see in the dark, her eyes had turned back to normal. She couldn't say the same about Jack though, he was still horribly pale, and though the pupils of his eyes had returned to oval, she'd noticed them flickering once in a while as they walked through the immense woods of the Carpathian Mountains, following Jack's lead, trusting him and his senses to take them back to the campsite.

Now that adrenaline and excitement of having escaped, _survived_, wore off they were tired and melancholic as they thought of those they'd lost in the cave, wondering, torturing themselves with the thought that maybe they could have done things different--torturing themselves with the thought that there were four people who should have been there with them.

Survivor's Guilt ate at them, and dampened their mood as they made the long trek through the mountains, shivering as the sun began to set and the chill of the night air surrounded them. They knew that nights in the Carpathian Mountains could get to temperatures of below zero, so despite their tiredness they walked on, not daring to stop to rest—they needed to keep their bodies warm, so they trudged on.

They kept close together, traveling under the light of the moon, keeping their ears open for danger. The Carpathian Mountains provided the habitat for the largest population of brown bears and wolves in Europe, so despite the fact that they'd made it out of the cave, they were still very much in danger--but at least they knew _these_ predators.

As the night dragged on, and Chloe stumbled for what seemed to be the hundredth time, she growled in frustration, trying to activate her night-vision and unable to. She wondered briefly if she needed to smell blood for her other senses to be activated--or if they were like her healing powers, and needed to be cultivated.

She desperately hoped it was the latter, otherwise she was just anther animal.

_Lex will know what to do_, she told herself over and over again, believing it completely and it was one of the only things that gave her comfort and strength as they continued on in the exhausting walk, each taking turns to help Top. Lex _always_ knew what to do, he was her stronghold, and he wouldn't let her down now, he _wouldn't_.

"Jack?" Charlie called from the back, it was her and Tyler's turn to help Top along. "How much longer until we reach the camp? I don't think I can continue walking."

"Not that much further." He promised, eyes on the darkness ahead of them. "It's just a little further ahead, I can see it."

The bushes to their right rustled, and the sound of a growl met their ears, causing everyone to turn towards it and freeze as a large brown bear emerged from bushes, the sounds of cubs yelping somewhere in the foliage behind her proving that they'd wandered into the path of a mama bear and she wasn't happy about it. Bears were known to be more aggressive when there were cubs involved.

"Nobody _move_." Jack hissed, eyes darkening and his pupils morphing to their four-point star shape once more…and Chloe suddenly realized that she could see in the dark again.

_Danger_… Chloe blinked. _It activates when I'm in danger!_

Jack moved slowly, surely, walking towards the bear, his eyes narrowed, something electric and predatory about his stance, a growl gurgling up in his throat.

The brown bear watched his advance before a whimper escaped her lips and she surprised everyone by taking rapid steps backwards, as if sensing a superior predator and terrified at the confrontation. The mother bear turned around and ran away, disappearing into the foliage.

The group stood in silent awe, watching their leader.

Chloe smiled at him in pride even though she _was_ worried about him. "Good job boss-man."

Jack turned and looked at her incredulously.

The others burst out in laughter, the tension in the group disappearing immediately as they shook their heads and began their journey, their spirits lighter.

* * *

"What do you _mean_ you've lost communication with them?" Lex Luthor was in a horrible mood as he glared at the men at the campsite. Their landing had been delayed at the airport, and then they'd had to transfer to the helicopter to be able to get to the remote campsite, and now that he'd finally arrived that and demanded that they get him communicated with Chloe and the rest of the team underground the people had the _galls_ to tell him point-blank that they'd lost communication with the team _hours_ ago, after an unexplained _earthquake_?

What type of fools did he have on his _team_? Why hadn't they contacted him with this information immediately?

"_WHY HAVEN'T YOU TRIED OPENING THE COLLAPSED CHAMBER?!_" Lois was now sober and not at all shy at letting the people around her know of her displeasure. "_THERE COULD BE INJURED PEOPLE DOWN THERE!"_

"Dr. Nicolai explicitly told us to leave them alone--." One technician feebly began.

"_Screw_ Dr. Nicolai!" Lois snapped, rounding up to the man and grabbing him by the front of his shirt, jerking the tiny man around viciously. "_He_ is _not_ the one who's signing your checks!"

They all stood outside the tents, Lois still shaking the small man so violently he was visibly shaking, and probably about to piss himself.

Lex wished he could lose control like Lois and display how _enraged_ he was, but he couldn't. He just wished that Chloe was here and that she was fine. He just wanted to hear her voice again.

"_Lex_?"

Great, now he was hallucinating about the sound of her voice.

God, he was just as pathetic as _Clark_!

"_LEX_!"

"Chloe?" Lois whispered.

Lex's eyes flew open as he realized that he wasn't the only one who'd heard the blonde's voice, and he turned in time to catch Chloe as she came flying into his arms, crying desperately, hugging him tightly, dressed in a wetsuit, feet bare and bleeding slightly, hair a mess.

She'd never been more beautiful to him.

He hugged her back, unable to believe that she was there, he didn't notice the others arriving behind her as he took in a whiff of the scent of sulfur in her hair, not caring at how horrible it was. She was here, she was in his arms, and everything would be fine.

A low, threatening growl resounded through the camp, and Lex looked up, looking at the lone figure that'd remained in the shadows, staying apart from the others.

Chloe tensed in his arms and pulled away, looking up into Lex's face, and his eyes widened when he saw her eyes. They were feline-like and molten _gold_.

"Lex, Jack and I--we need your help."

She didn't get a chance to continue because Lois had suddenly gotten over her shock and rushed towards her, hugging her tightly, crying. "I thought you were dead! Don't you _ever_ do something like that again!"

Chloe seemed surprised Lois was there, but she comforted her cousin anyway.

Lex tore his gaze form Chloe's face, unable to help but find that despite how _unnatural_ her eyes were, she was still so goddamned _beautiful_. His gaze went to the other survivors, as they were talking rapidly to the people at the campsite, and then he turned to the lone figure still covered by the shadows, watching him, stance tense.

Lex frowned.

So _this_ was the infamous _Jack_.

He narrowed his eyes as another warning growl reached him from the shadowy figure.

What the _hell_ had happened down below in that cave?

* * *

Hey everyone! How about a review to tell me what you think about what's happened so far?


	7. Chapter 7

**Disclaimer: I do not own Smallville or The Cave or any characters mentioned in either. I, unfortunately, also don't own Lex Luthor (Michael Rosenbaum would be more than sufficient), Jack McAlister, OR Tyler McAlister either. Shucks. My life SUCKS man! **

_Heya everyone! I'm back with the new update, a bit later than usual, but it IS an update--plus, I've been busy with the finishing of "Winds of Change" (one more chapter to go there!), and I've been really sick with this mystery ailment that has me with cramps and muscle ache and headache and nausea and sore throat and dizziness…yeah, so life has been complicated._

_Also, while I had the sequel to this already planned, I'm having some problems with it so I've been stressing about that and it factors in how I finish of this story, which, as I've stated in numerous postings, is like a prequel to a series. So I need to know how to do this, because things that are left unanswered here mightn't be answered (or should be answered) in the next xover in the series (God, I have a lot planned and I hope I don't end up stopping in the middle of the series because it should be fun!)_

_And I'm glad that so many people like Jack! Because while there will be some chlex and maybe other small Chloe/other side pairings, the main pairing should be Jack/Chloe (even if he doesn't appear physically in one or two of the stories)…and the rest shall be explained later!_

_**Just for curiosity--who is willing to continue on reading the stories in this series?**_

_Oh well, enough with my rambling…onto the next chapter!_

* * *

There weren't many things that surprised Lex, but this certainly had.

They'd taken his chopper back to the airport and then had flown on the jet to Lexcorp's closest facility, and during the ride Chloe, a pale animalistic looking Jack McAlister, his brother Tyler, and friends Charlie and Top, filled in Lois and Lex about all that'd gone on down below in the cave. Lex had a feeling that Chloe was hiding something, but he knew not to rush her, not when they were in such a crowd.

Both Chloe and Jack had already undergone the first series of examinations, and although the results they'd gotten back were preliminary and they were already scheduled to undergo the second testing phase, the results they'd gotten back were shocking. Chloe had 24 chromosomes. The human body only had _23_ chromosomes, so the fact that in the little amount of time that she'd been in the cave, Chloe had mysteriously developed an _additional_ one, well, it was _astounding_.

They'd already planned tests to try and discover _what_ this 24th chromosome did and _how_ it'd come to be. Maybe the two parasites that'd been within her, when they'd fought each other in her body and vanquish the other's corporal body (for tests had shown that neither parasite existed within her anymore) _their essence_ had unified with Chloe's, and the 24th chromosome had been born.

Jack, on the other hand, was a completely different story. He still had the normal 23 chromosomes, but his had altered. They seemed more _animalistic_ than human, and that was why he was acting more on instinct than by using thought process, as would a normal human being. The man was literally turning into an _animal_ before their very eyes, and Lex was worried, not only for the man, but for _Chloe_--because the man had a possessiveness within him when it came to the blonde--a possessiveness Chloe seemed to accept--a possessiveness Lex didn't appreciate.

Jack's mutation had been stopped at one point, but it was a continually processing action, and when he'd nearly collapsed during the physical manifestations of the mutation, and Chloe had shocked Lex by offering Jack her _blood_, well, that'd left the billionaire silent, not only in slight jealousy at the obvious closeness between them, but at the fact that Chloe'd discovered a breakthrough without even realizing it.

Her blood was acting like a protective serum within Jack's body, but when taken orally a lot of the nutrients and antibodies were digested and lost. So with Chloe's permission, Lex had small vials filled with blood extracted from her and injected straight into Jack's bloodstream--where it would work quicker--something like poison.

Within a week Jack's skin had returned almost completely normal, although the doctors warned them that Jack would never return fully to the man he was before because of the mutations within him. He'd be paler than he'd been, and he'd still act on animalistic instinct--something he was going to have to learn how to control, because while it was an asset, if left with the reigns of control, it could be very dangerous as well.

Daily a vial was injected into his system to fight the effects of the parasite within him, which couldn't be removed. It'd clung to him, multiplying rapidly, and there was no way of removing it that wouldn't end with Jack's life. At least with each injection of Chloe's blood, Jack's parasite seemed to change slightly, grow more neutral, more passive, and the mutations were slowing until a whole day passed without even a slight _quiver_ from him, and his eyes returned completely normal despite their predatory-gleam…and that was when they knew that they were on the right path.

During the second week Lois had 'borrowed' Lex's jet and flown back to Metropolis, decided to ask Perry to extend her time. She wanted to be there for her cousin during this long, arduous time, and plus, she'd been giving Top the 'eye', and Lex couldn't help but mentally tell Clark to come back from his stay at the Fortress or he'd have even _more_ to be frustrated about.

Lex also couldn't help but shake his head at Lois Lane. The woman was a paradox. She hated flying, probably had a little phobia about it, and yet she was trained and could fly anything from a small commercial plane to a military helicopter. Being a military brat, she'd learnt to fight hand-to-hand, to shoot, to fight with knives, she'd learnt to operate the more complex military weapons, and operate tanks and whatnot. She'd spilled all this information while drunk on the plane ride to Romania--and yet, if one looked at the woman, they'd never believe her capable of all of that--of _any_ of that.

"I wanted to thank you."

Lex looked up and saw that Tyler McAlister had come over to talk to him. They were all in the 'mess hall', as Lois called it, and he'd been watching Chloe and Jack, as she sat watching a movie, and Jack sat watching her.

"You didn't have to help my brother." Tyler continued, sitting down next to him, looking a little uncomfortable but determined. "We're nothing to you, you could have even turned Jack into some kind of guinea pig, treated him like just another experiment--but you've treated him with respect, and as if he's still human, so--."

"You're brother _is_ human." Lex interrupted, tearing his gaze from the look on Jack's face as he watched the oblivious Chloe. "He is a mutant, no doubt about that, but mutants are only a more evolved species of human being—what we could have been--_should have_ been, if we hadn't been deficient in our molecular structure."

Tyler paused, blinking, surprised, as if he hadn't thought of it that way before. A small smile touched his face. "Do you really believe that? That they're just more evolved then us?"

"Of course." Lex nodded. "I've known Chloe since she was fourteen, and she's more human than _me_."

Tyler grinned full-force. "She _is_ something, huh?"

"Yeah." Lex stole a gaze at the sofa once more, noticing that Chloe had caught Jack looking at her and was grinning at him mischievously. He cleared his throat and returned his attention to Tyler. "She's a very special and important person to me, and there isn't a day I'd ever call her something that wasn't a human. I envy her sometimes."

"I don't envy my brother." Tyler admitted, eyes on Jack, who was saying something to Chloe that had her gasping in shock and slapping his arm, throwing her head back and laughing. "I know Jack better than anyone else in this world, and I know when he's putting on a strong face, when he's pretending that everything's okay. He isn't fine. This is affecting him in ways we'll never be able to understand."

Lex agreed one hundred per cent with that observation; as a man who hid his _own_ emotions, he knew how to detect when someone _else_ was doing the same.

"I think they're the only ones who can understand each other." Tyler McAlister was a surprisingly _perceptive_ human being. "I mean, while according to your studies they aren't exactly the same _species_, they're a hybrid, right? So they are closer to being of the same species than Jack and me or even Chloe and her cousin."

"Yes." Lex had been thinking about that himself these last two weeks. He'd been going over their blood-work, their DNA composition, their organic structures--_everything_, and he realized that while they shared similar traits and such, their internal body was _different_. It was as if they were from two different branches of evolution--the animalistic and the humanoid--each with it's own pros and cons.

But despite that, despite their differences, their bodies were closer and more similar to each other than to or with that of a normal human being.

Lex--it'd gotten to the point where Lex wondered if either of them could have offspring with someone of the human race. He didn't even know if they could create offspring _together_.

He hadn't told them of that possibility, knowing that while Chloe didn't want children _now_ she wanted them later, and hoping that his assumptions were off somewhere in the calculations. He didn't want to have to be the one to tell Chloe that she'd never be able to have children. He just _didn't_, and he wasn't about to say anything unless he was a hundred per cent sure.

He _refused_ to.

"I would like to see them fight each other."

Tyler looked at Lex in surprise. "_Why_?"

"I don't know if you've realized it, but your brother loses control of his power easily--I don't really think he has any control over it at all." The bald billionaire confessed. "I'd like to see how their bodies and mutations react to each other in a situation like that. And it's also help us be able to understand exactly _what_ they can do in a safe environment."

Tyler frowned, looking at Jack and Chloe who were laughing and smiling at each other on the sofa. "I think you're right."

Lex nodded. With the consent of Jack's brother, he shouldn't have any problem with this.

Of course, there were other reasons why he wanted the fight to happen. He'd noticed Jack's inability to control his powers, noticed how his eyes darkened and he snarled whenever any male got too close to Chloe--especially Chloe. When he was angered, or felt any _surplus_ amount of emotion his skin sometimes rippled and he'd clench his fist and looked away—something had to leave the _room_.

In an environment when he was not only fighting, but fighting _Chloe_, well, that would put Jack up against the wall in many ways, and if he would snap, he'd snap _there_, and they'd finally know exactly _what_ they were dealing with. And while it was a somewhat callous way of going about it, Lex knew it was the only way, and that they needed to know this in case--he needed to protect Chloe, and right now Jack was the only potential threat she had.

* * *

Lois stormed out of the Daily Planet with a box of her things. She'd known that Perry wouldn't take well to her taking all the vacations she'd worked through all at once, but she hadn't thought he'd _fire_ her. The brunette sniffed and had told him that he couldn't fire her because she _quit_, she'd then called him a couple of names, told him she'd tell his wife about all the cigars he'd been smoking despite his doctor's orders for him to stop, and then she'd collected her things and left.

She took in a deep breath and headed towards her car. She would go to her apartment, pack up all the things she'd need, and a couple of things she was taking just _because_--and head back to the airport, where she'd left the Luthor jet she'd borrowed without really asking Lex's permission. Of course, she'd make a quick detour to the grocery store before going to the airport to buy some good junk food--because those foreign stuff really weren't cutting it, and then she was in the jet and in the air.

She just really wished that Smallville was there. The guy was clueless and all, but for some reason when he was around things went well--and she needed things for Chloe to go well. Her baby cousin was going through a very trying time, trying to adjust to her new mutation and the _pull_ she was having for the handsome Jack McAlister, and the previous feelings she'd had for Lex.

Lois had to admit, she liked McAlister--the guy was _hot_, but she'd always thought that Chloe would end up with _Lex_. Then again--with how things were going with Lex, she could now understand _why_ he'd just sit down and let Chloe get closer to Jack despite his obvious feelings for her.

It'd been a huge mystery for the Daily Planet reporter (well, she'd still worked there at the time) _why_ a man like Lex Luthor, who always went for what he wanted, would let Chloe slowly slip away from him and not take a chance on winning her. And then Lois had done some digging. She hadn't included Smallville in this little investigation because she knew he had some uptight morals and would either hinder her investigation or warn her target…and when she'd finally dug up the information needed and finally understood _why_ Lex wasn't making a move for Chloe--she'd learnt to appreciate the bald billionaire so very _much_.

He was dying.

He'd had cancer as a young boy, and it'd returned.

She'd stormed to confront him about this, calling him a selfish, proud fool and demanding to know the reason _why_ he hadn't told Chloe and asked her to heal him of the cancer. She _could_ heal him, of that Lois was sure.

At first Lex had been furious with her for digging up what he'd thought was a well buried secret, and then he'd sighed and sat down in his seat and told her everything. He was draining Chloe, unintentionally, but ever since the first time she'd brought him to life, every time she'd healed him, something within him had drained her a bit of her power of healing, and they'd been minor injuries. He believed it was somehow related to some passive meteor ability that he had, but he wasn't so sure.

Lois had sat down across from Lex and listened as he explained that he still had some time left with the treatments he was doing, but that he wasn't going to get cured this time. And he couldn't ask Chloe to heal him--couldn't even tell her the truth because she'd try to heal him against his own will. The billionaire said that this was too fatal a cancer, and that it'd probably send her into a mini-coma from healing him--and also, it could very well drain her of her ability to heal--both herself and others.

And Lex wasn't about to let her risk that on him. As he'd pointed out, it was only Chloe's abilities that'd kept her alive during her many misadventures, and without them she'd die--and he'd prefer to die a million times knowing that she was fine, than to live a long and healthy life and have to bury her.

Lois had left that meeting understanding Lex like she never had, and despite the fact that she still enjoyed annoying him, she respected him more than she did anyone else.

That was why she was so torn now that Jack McAlister was in the story and complicated things even _more_.

Out of the corner of her eye she saw someone large wearing a hideous red jacket, and her heart leaped. _Smallville_!

But then the person turned and hailed a cab and she got a good look at the guy.

_Not Smallville_.

Telling herself firmly that _no_ she was _not_ disappointed that it wasn't _him_, the brunette grabbed her keys and opened the back door of her car, placing the box in the back seat and sighing, closing the door and going to the driver's side. She entered and closed the door, locking the locks on instinct, putting on her seatbelt and turning the keys in the ignition, looking at the review mirror before signaling her intentions and easing out from the parking space into the ongoing traffic.

_Stupid Smallville_. She pouted, heading towards her apartment. _Never around when I need him_.

* * *

"Where is she? I'm going to _kill_ her."

Everyone looked up in surprise to see a man in the room who hadn't been there seconds ago.

Chloe's eyes widened and she rose from the sofa, not noticing Jack's gaze narrowing at the large smile on her face. "Clark!"

The tall muscular man looked at her and smiled, widening his arms as she flew into them, hugging him tightly. "Hey Chlo, how are you doing?"

"I'm fine--errr--well, not exactly fine." She pulled away and smiled up into his face. "And Lois isn't here. She called me before she took off--should probably still be in the air." She knew who he'd been referring to when he'd entered, known that the only person he threatened to kill whenever she wasn't around was the woman he'd give his life to protect.

"She got herself fired." Clark announced seriously. "I got back seconds ago and went into the office and Perry tells me that I'm now the only star reporter of the Daily Planet and that he fired Lois--and then she quit on him."

Chloe frowned. Lois hadn't told her about that when they'd talked on the phone! "Oh no, this is all my fault."

Clark still had her in his arms. "Chloe, what's going on?"

She looked around them, noticing Charlie and Tyler sitting together in the dark corner, looking up at them curiously, Lex and Top had disappeared from the room before the Kryptonian's arrival, and Jack was glaring at Clark.

This was not the place.

"Come, we need to talk."

"Where are we going?" Clark asked, looking at the others as well. "Who are they?"

"We're going to my room--." As soon as those words escaped her lips, an angered growl echoed throughout the room, and Chloe's eyes widened as she turned to look at Jack, who was standing, eyes morphed into their four-point star shape, glaring threateningly at Clark.

Clark was tense, looking back at Jack in surprise but not fear. "No, Chloe, I think you're going to have to tell me _now_."

"Who is _he_?" Jack snapped, eyes darkening, fists clenched tightly.

"He's my friend." Chloe frowned at Jack. She'd tolerated his possessiveness these last two weeks, but she needed to talk to Clark, and didn't want Jack to attack him and expose Clark's secret to the whole room. She knew that it was the animal in Jack, the male in him that recognized her as the only female of his _species_ that made him act this way towards her, knew that because he was the only male _her_ body recognized as of her same _species_ as well.

And when there was only one of your species left, one tended to get _possessive_ and _territorial_.

"And what do you have to say to him that you can't say in front of us?" In front of _him_.

Chloe narrowed her eyes at him. "That would be _my_ business, Jack McAlister, and if you don't like it, _too bad_!"

He growled, muscles tensing, and he stormed towards her.

Clark, sensing the threat, tried to push her behind him protectively, but Chloe got passed him, eyes flashing molten gold as she met Jack halfway. Both glaring at each other, hissing, communicating on a more primitive level that not even _they_ could fully understand except for the fact that the male in Jack was demanding that the female in Chloe _submit_, but the female in Chloe was a modern woman and with a snarl she let him understand exactly _what_ he could do with his demand.

Jack growled at her, taking another step until they were only an inch away from each other, and suddenly the snarls were beginning to morph from angered to…to something _else_, as Jack closed his eyes with a moan of pleasure and just _sniffed_ the scent coming from her.

Blushing in embarrassment, realizing that everyone was _watching_ them, Chloe pulled away, breaking the spell, and grabbing a confused and surprised Clark's hand. "Come on, big guy. You and I need to talk."

She pulled Clark behind her, surprised that she was actually _pulling_ him and not him _letting_ her. Apparently she was _that_ strong.

The sound of Jack's growl behind them promised her that this wasn't over, but Chloe closed her eyes and continued to tug the big alien behind her, trying to tell her body to calm down.

* * *

Tyler watched his brother as Jack growled in frustration and stormed out of the room in the opposite direction Chloe and her friend had taken. The dark-haired McAlister frowned, realizing how quickly Jack had lost control and if Chloe hadn't confronted him like that, he probably would have attacked her friend--God knew Tyler had noticed his brother fighting his urge to do the same thing with Luthor.

Sighing, Tyler sat back down, realizing that Lex was right. They needed to see just _how far_ Jack would snap, and Chloe was the only one who could both infuriate and apparently _calm_ whatever reacted within him, so she would have to be the one fighting him.

"He's going to be okay."

Tyler looked up at Charlie and smiled sadly. "I hope so."

The pretty blonde sat down next to him and placed her hand comfortingly on his shoulder. "Come on, Tyler, we both know Jack better than anyone else, and we know that he's a fighter. Even if it takes him a hundred years to get control over this, he _will_."

His smile turned slightly more genuine, and Tyler placed his hand on Charlie's. "You're right. He's going to get through this okay. He's going to be okay. He's going to get control of this."

"Exactly." Her smile was bright. "We're just going to have to be supportive and be with him a hundred per cent no matter _what_ happens in the future. Jack's still our family, we love him, and we need to let him know that nothing of that has changed."

Finally, his smile was completely genuine. "You're a sweetheart, you know that, right?"

Charlie blushed, pulling her hand from his and looking in the opposite direction. "Oh, shut up."

He chuckled.

She ignored him.

Comfortable silence rested in the room as they sat together, neither talking, neither _needing _to.

* * *

Clark looked down at the Kryptonian crystal in his hands and listened as Chloe finished telling him the story of how she'd found it. There was a itching behind his eyes and he knew he was about to cry, but his frustration was what kept the tears at bay.

"You could have gotten yourself _killed_!"

"I wanted to do this for you, Clark." Her hand was on his arm, and suddenly he realized that he hadn't been keeping his tears back at all, he was crying, he just hadn't noticed it. "I _needed_ to do this for you. The scrolls said that this crystal was important for the Son of EL, and I knew that you couldn't go look for it, you're too busy saving the world and keeping Lois out of trouble. I _knew_ you would forfeit your own knowledge--wouldn't take the time out--and I'm glad. That place had Green K. I only found one piece but that wasn't to say that there wouldn't have been more. It was a death trap for Kryptonians. You'd be weak, alone, and a feast for the monsters."

He winced, thinking back to all the things that she'd gone through to get this for him. She'd gone against her own fears of the dark and enclosed spaces, she'd gone against monsters from _hell_, all to give him this. And because of it she'd been injured, and been infected with some horrible parasite is own people had invented to keep the crystal safe.

Rao, he didn't deserve this woman for a best friend.

"Don't say that, Clark."

Apparently he'd said it out loud.

The Kryptonian looked down at the short blonde woman smiling shakily up at him before pulling her to him in a hug. "_Thank you_." Clark whispered into Chloe's hair, realizing that his tears were soaking her blonde locks, but when he tried to pull away she hugged him harder and he gave him, just hugging her and crying.

When it was over, when he finally pulled away, he looked down into her face. "Will you come with me to see what's on it?"

She smiled. "Of course. Let me just get a jacket."

* * *

"The life and sunshine has returned to this house!" Lois announced brightly as she entered the Luthor Manor everyone was staying in later that night. So far she didn't see anyone about, but it _was_ around dinnertime, so she was sure that everyone was eating by the table or in the mess hall. "I need big, strong, manly men to help me unpack some things from the rental car!"

Top peeked his head from one of the rooms and smiled, coming towards her. The two weeks had made the soreness leave his healed foot and he could now walk around. Lex appeared behind Top, they'd obviously been having a serious conversation, but Lois wasn't about to start digging. She had other things she needed done right now and snooping wasn't on the agenda.

"Hello Lois, did you have a good flight?"

"Yes, Lex, thank you very much." She tossed him a bag, ignoring the jibe about her taking the jet without even giving him a heads up. "The rest is in the car."

Top chuckled.

Lex just sighed.

"So, where's Chloe?" Lois asked, turning on the two men, hands on her hips expectantly.

Lex frowned. "She should be in the mess hall with the others. That's the last place I saw her."

"Okay. I'll go look for her there." She chirped, determined not to let her being without a job leave her depressed. She could always find another job (if Perry didn't realize that she was the best reporter he had and begged her to come back) and if she didn't want to work with a newspaper, she knew Lex would give her a job. Damn, she'd enjoy working alongside Chloe. That girl didn't have one boring minute! "You two can take my stuff to my room--but don't break anything."

She was _sure_ she heard those two complaining to each other, but she just grinned, heading towards the mess hall, frowning when she saw that the only ones in there were Tyler and Charlie, who were seated close to each other and talking in whispers.

Jack and Chloe were missing.

Where could they be?

"Hey Lois!" Charlie pulled away from Tyler when she suddenly saw the brunette in the doorway, blushing. "How did everything go?"

Okay, that blonde was _nervous_. Had something happened between her and the dark-haired McAlister?

"Everything's fine." Lois smiled serenely. "Do you know where Chloe is? I really need to talk to her."

"Some friend of hers arrived and they went to talk in her room." Tyler spoke from where he sat. "I think she called him _Clark_, but I'm not too sure about that."

_Clark!_ He was _here_!

Smiling, Lois turned and left the room without another word, hurrying towards Chloe's room and throwing the door open, smile disappearing when she realized that it was empty.

The brunette sighed, leaning against the door.

_Where could they be?_

* * *

In the Fortress of Solitude, Clark gave Chloe a nervous smile before inserting the crystal into the crystal dock and watching as it lit up. Suddenly a panel of light shot into the air, and the light became images…

Clark gasped as he saw images of him as a baby, gurgling as his mother and father, Jor-EL and Lara, played with him. The young Kryptonian squeezed Chloe's hand as they ended up sitting on the cold floor, watching as what could be described in human terms as a series of _homemade movies_ filled the holographic screen. They heard the young Clark laughing as Lara blew against his stomach, heard his squealing in happiness as his father took him on piggyback rides all around their home.

Something welled up inside of Clark as he caught a glimpse of what his life had been--what it could have continued being. He saw his father, Jor-EL in a way he'd never before, saw the fatherly love that shone in his eyes as he watched his wife and son, as he played with Clark, teaching him Kryptonian ways as any father would, and telling him how he loved him, how he was proud of him, and how he knew that he would grow up to be a good man.

He didn't know how long they stood there, watching movie after movie, getting glimpses of Krypton and his people, but he knew that Chloe was there by his side, crying along with him, and when it was finished, the screen lit up with an intergalactic map.

Clark froze.

It was of a secret, safe-planet that the Kryptonians had had.

Did--could this mean--?

"Clark?" Chloe asked, voice breathy in excitement as she turned to look at him. "Do you think--could some of your people have escaped to that planet before the explosion?"

Hearing her ask the same question that'd been ringing in his ears caused Clark to stand up immediately. "But if so--why did my father send me to _earth_ and _not_ to that planet?"

"Maybe he didn't trust anyone in Krypton to take care of you." Chloe whispered. "You would be the only living EL relative--so if you were killed the house of EL would have been lost. Plus, your father realized around that time how many enemies he'd made and how he didn't even know who he could really trust of his own race to take care of you and not kill you while you were only a helpless child."

"Kryptonias would have killed me to take over the power of the name of EL." Clark looked up, eyes on his friend, determination written on his every feature as he spoke. "Chloe, I need to find that planet."

* * *

Jack sat on the rooftop of the manor, looking up at the moon resting peacefully in the sky above him.

He knew that what he'd done in there was wrong, and he felt ashamed. Chloe wasn't anything to him, and yet he was treating her as if she was his _property_. It was just that even before this mess had started he'd been attracted to her, had looked up into her green eyes and been _lost_, and then, after the infection, after everything that'd gone on in the cave, well, he'd felt as if she was _his_, and didn't like the attention other rival males gave her.

_'Rival males', listen to me!_

He scoffed, sighing, looking around him with a sigh. He knew that his eyes were normal again, and yet he was still able to pierce the darkness around him. He wondered if that was a step back or a step forwards.

And not only was his eyesight getting better, but so was his ability to _smell_…

He growled, closing his eyes as he remembered her scent when they'd confronted each other a while ago. They'd both been stiff, ready to fight, and yet he'd stepped in her personal space and that heat had turned into a different kind…and he'd smelt her smell change…smelt the musky scent of a female _ready_ for her male…

_God! Don't think of that now McAlister!_

Jack didn't notice the blood seeping from his closed fists as his fingernails pierced the skin of his palms.

He was too concentrated on keeping himself away from Chloe before he…before he did something he'd regret.

* * *

"Smallville!" The smile died on Lois' face when Clark and Chloe returned, and she saw the look on their faces.

The brunette stiffened, knowing from the way Clark looked at her that he was going to say something that she didn't like, but she hadn't expected what he told her. She didn't even notice when Chloe went to find Lex and left them to talk in her bedroom. The young woman just couldn't believe it when Clark told her what he was going to do.

"_Leave_?!" She tried to breathe, tried to look nonchalant, but the fact was that that her heart was hurting…_so much_. "But you can't be serious! Clark! You don't know if this isn't a trap! Or if that planet wasn't destroyed in the explosion! Or how long it'll take you to find it!"

"Lois--." He winced, looking at her sadly, looking just as destroyed as she knew she looked.

"No!" She shook her head vehemently. "What about Metropolis? What about the people? How are they going to survive without Superman to take care of them?"

"Metropolis survived quite well before I came on the scene." Clark sighed, not looking at her. "They'll survive without Superman for however long it takes for me to do this."

"But what about the _Daily Planet_?" Lois wouldn't back down, she needed to make him see that he was making a mistake--that leaving was a _huge_ mistake! "Perry fired me--he _needs_ you right now! The Planet NEEDS a half-decent reporter!"

"He'll call you back and beg you to come back." Clark smiled softly, though he still wouldn't look in her direction. "We both know that he can't run that place without you."

"What--what about _Martha_?" She knew she was puling at strings, _and_ hitting below the belt, but she just didn't care anymore. "Your mother _needs_ you! What sort of son would you be by just abandoning her like that when she's getting on in age? _No_! You have to stay here and take care of her and continue working at the Daily Planet and taking care of the city of Metropolis--taking care of _your_ city!"

"I already talked to my mother." He surprised her by saying. "Before we returned here from the Fortress, Chloe and I went to see her in Smallville and she understood me. She said that she understood how important this was for me and that she wouldn't stand in my way. Lex and Chloe…and _you_ will take care of her while I'm gone. I know that."

"What about _me_?" Lois' voice croaked as she finally let out of the plea that'd she'd been crying in her mind ever since she'd heard his idea to explore the universe and galaxies to find this supposed 'safe planet'. "What about _me_? How can you just go and leave _me_?"

She hated it, hated being forced to admit her weakness, her feelings, hated opening herself like this and making herself vulnerable. She hated the tears in her eyes, the frog in her throat, and the knife stabbing her heart and causing her more pain than she'd ever known possible to feel.

Clark couldn't leave--he wouldn't—he _couldn't_ leave her. No. He wouldn't. He—_No!_

And he was holding her as she cried, holding him tightly, burying her face in his chest.

"Don't leave me, Clark." She begged. She _pleaded_. "_Please_ don't leave me." She held on as tight as she could despite the fact that she knew with his strength he could easily detangle himself from her if he wanted to. "I don't want to lose you, Clark." She whispered, breaking down slowly and surely. "I don't want—I—I—I _love_ you, Clark."

And he pulled her closer to him. "I love you too, Lo."

She felt her heart soar--.

"But I have to do this."

--and crash.

Pushing away, Lois looked up into his face, wiping at her tears. "I love you, Clark Kent. I _LOVE_ YOU." She tried to keep the sobs back, she needed to let him know this. "But I'm not going to wait on you. If you leave now, I won't be sitting on my thumbs waiting for you to come back. I'll move on. It'll hurt like _hell_, but I'll force myself to stop loving you."

He looked heartbroken as he looked at her, pained blue eyes scanning her face. "Lois, _please_, you have to understand--."

He was going to leave her.

Even after she'd taken the chance and spoken to him, even after she'd told him the truth, after she'd given him her heart on a silver platter--he was still going to leave her.

"When you find this planet you're willing to risk everything over--if you ever do." She whispered, wiping at her tears desperately. "Maybe you should just _stay_ there."

"_Lois_--." He pleaded.

"_No_,_ Kent_. Just—just forget _everything_ I just said since it didn't mean _anything_ to you." She needed to get out of there before she lost it and begged him once more to stay. She needed to retain some dignity. She _refused_ for his last memory of her to be one of her weak and _begging_. "Have a good trip, Kent. Send a postcard once in a while so Chloe doesn't die of worry."

"_Lois…"_ His broken voice called as she turned.

Lois closed her eyes tightly and left the room…

…Leaving a big piece of her heart back there with him.

_I wasn't enough_. She rushed away, needing to find Chloe. _I'm never enough._

* * *

Hey everyone! I updated! One or two more chapters into this prequel before the next story in the series! This story really set the stage for what is supposed to happen in the series! Well, review?


	8. Chapter 8

**Disclaimer: I do not own Smallville or The Cave or any characters mentioned in either. I, unfortunately, also don't own Lex Luthor (Michael Rosenbaum would be more than sufficient), Jack McAlister, OR Tyler McAlister either. Shucks. My life SUCKS man! **

_Hey everyone, I went over things and seeing how I wanted to do things and the quicker way to post and all of that, and decided that this is the last chapter to "The Cave". Because of my illness I haven't been able to think well because I'm drugged up and in a lot of pain, and my muse is really more interested in getting me better and stop the pain than in giving me ideas…so I'm going to just wrap up the things in this chapter and then start on the first chapter of the next story in this series, since I already know what's going to happen in __**that**__._

_Just wanted to let you know that._

_So this is the last chapter, which is dedicated to __**boredlittlestudent**__, who inspired me to write it by sending me banners and icons made for this story, which I really liked! So thank __**boredlittlestudent**__ for getting me to write and all that despite the fact that I feel like crap._

_Enjoy._

_**WARNING: SLIGHT, BRIEF SMUT AHEAD. IF YOU DO NOT LIKE IT, PLEASE SKIP THE **__**SECOND**__** SECTION WITH CHLOE'S POV.**_

* * *

Martha Kent stood next to her son, listening to him sadly as he finished telling her of how things had gone with Lois. When she'd first realized that her son was in love with his colleague, with the woman whom Martha had somewhat adopted alongside Chloe as the daughters she'd never had, well, she'd been happy although she'd known that it was going to be a bumpy ride for her son and Lois to be happy together.

And she was so angry that Jor-EL still seemed to be ruining Clark's life. If the interfering AI hadn't told Clark and Chloe about the new secret room of the Kawatche Caves, they wouldn't have found the scrolls, and Chloe wouldn't have risked her life in such a _terrible_ way and she wouldn't have found the Kryptonian Crystal with the images of a life lived and with directions to only God knew where. If it hadn't been for all of that, Lois and Clark would be together, happy, but Clark would now never be happy if he didn't do this.

The redhead understood why her son wanted to do this, wanted to find his own people and get to understand himself, his abilities, and his heritage better. God knew that the only Kryptonians Clark had ever met had all been psychotic, and that was an image and a memory that'd always haunted him, wanting to know if _all_ of his people were so bloodthirsty and cruel--if _he_ one day would snap and become a tyrant of earth.

"I have to do this, mother." He whispered to her, standing tall.

"I know my son." She whispered before hugging him, holding him close to her heart, never once realizing how long it'd be until she would be able to do this again. "I know."

* * *

Chloe pulled away from her sleeping cousin and sighed, looking down at the distraught-looking-even-in-sleep Lois Lane. She couldn't help but feel a little guilty because, well, it was because of _her_ that Clark was going to travel and explore the universe for this planet, but Lois didn't blame Chloe, surprisingly, even when she'd confessed everything. Lois had said that it was only Chloe being a good friend, and that Clark's leaving was all Clark's decision and fault.

Lex had entered Chloe's room in the middle of the sob-fest, and had been somewhat blindsided by a tearful Lois Lane who'd given herself a job in Lexcorp as Chloe's assistance. Chloe remembered the slightly freaked look on the billionaire's face as Lois cried and sobbed and demanded and, well, he'd just nodded and quickly excused himself out of the room.

So Lois was now officially Chloe's assistant.

They were in for a _lot_ of misadventures in the future!

Easing out of her room, Chloe closed the door behind her and sighed, traveling the dark hallway, realizing that everyone had gone to bed. While she couldn't get her eyes to transform, they accustomed themselves enough to the darkness for her to be able to travel the different turns of the hallway and find herself heading up the stairs to the flat rooftop of the building, knowing that he was there, awake, tracking her like she was him.

She move swiftly, blending in with the shadows until she'd made it to the rooftop and sat down next to Jack silently, both looking up at the sky.

"She went to sleep." It was a statement, not a question, as Jack sat looking up at the stars, the darkness shadowing his face.

"Yeah." Chloe nodded, feeling calm and at ease as she sat next to him. "I'm just sorry that Lois and Clark finally admitted their feelings for each other so _late_. I mean, they confessed everything right before he had to go to his, uh, birth country to try and find any family he might actually have left. This is important for him--but so is Lois--so I'm sorry that he had to choose."

Jack was silent as he lowered his gaze and looked unseeingly at the shadows in front of him. "He needs time to figure himself out. He--he needs to be alone, and she will only be a distraction for him." There was a pause. "A man can't give himself to the woman he loves, he doesn't even have the right to fight for her, if he isn't whole."

And suddenly Chloe wondered if the blonde man _wasn't_ talking about Clark. "_Jack_?"

He turned and looked at her for the first time since she'd joined him on the rooftop, his eyes normal but determined. "Chloe. I have to go."

She gasped, looking at him in horror. "But—but—_Jack_! You _can't_ just _go_! Look at you! You might be normal right now--but--but--but you need me—need my _blood_!"

"Chloe, I like you." Jack told her, looking somewhat embarrassed and yet completely serious as his eyes traced every feature of her face, as if putting each curve to memory. "I--this _thing_ inside of me _wants_ you, it's dangerously _possessive_ of you. I--every time some guy goes close to you--even Tyler--I want to rip his throat out--and what's more frightening is that I _can_ rip his throat out if I lose control and let the creature in me have control."

"I--I like you _too_, Jack." She tore her gaze from his, blushing. "But I'm not going to let you just _run away_ like this. You confronted hungry demons from _hell_ without even batting an eyelash, but you're running away from _me_ and I won't accept that, not when my blood is the only thing that's keeping you normal, in control."

"I'm _not_ in control, Chloe!" Jack snapped, standing, and in a fluid movement Chloe was on her feet as well as they squared off, eyes flashing, his dark hers golden. "_I'm not in control, I have __**never **__been in control_." His eyes, now completely black, not a speck of white or color to be seen, narrowed dangerously on her as he took a step towards her and she stood her ground. "_It_ has all the control, Chloe, I'm a puppet on a string, with an invisible puppeteer pulling all the strings and controlling my every movement!"

She winced at that thought but kept still as he advanced on her, sniffing, breathing in her scent. "You _can_ get the control, Jack."

"I _know_." His voice was deeper, throaty, as he stood before her, clenching his fists tightly as they hung limp at his side, the metallic smell of blood curling in the air around them and causing Chloe to close her eyes and whimper slightly. "But I can't--not with you around."

Her eyes flew open and she tilted her head back slightly to look into the midnight depth of the blackness of his eyes.

"When I see you, _smell_ you, I just want to--I want to--and _it_ takes control." His hands, covered with his own blood, went to her shoulders and squeezed hard, giving her a little shake. "I will _hurt_ you, Chloe, and I will _kill_ all those around you when I finally snap."

"No, you _won't_."

"_I will_." He promised, his fingers digging painfully into the skin of her arms, and they both knew that if it weren't for her healing properties she'd have horrible bruises in the morning. "And I won't have you that way."

The truth was in those inhuman, demonic eyes of his, and yet the fear Chloe felt wasn't for herself, but for those around her, for Lex, for _Lois_--.

"So you finally believe me." He whispered, tearing his hands from her arms and turning his back on her, breathing in and out slowly, as if trying to regain a little control over himself. "I have to get as far away from here--from _you_-- as possible, Chlo. I _have_ to if I want to save the little humanity I have left inside of me."

She hated it, hated the shiver in his voice when he said that, as if he truly believed that he was truly only a creature. But she realized that he truly _was_ fighting himself, and he needed her to _help_ him, not fight him as well. "I understand." He needed her to be supportive of him, even if the thought of being away from him made something inside of her sick. "I'm going to go to the laboratory and have them draw out more of my blood."

In seconds he'd turned and grabbed her arm, preventing her from leaving. "Why?"

"You'll need as many injections as possible." She whispered, letting her bangs fall into her face and hide her from his penetrating gaze. "My blood is the only thing that's helping you keep the little control you have right now, and if my being near you is undoing that, I understand that you need to go. I don't _want_ you to go, I _don't_, but I'm going to be supportive because I understand your side of this."

Jack was silent for a moment as he only _watched_ her. "You don't need to draw more blood for me, Chloe. You're weak enough as it is from the amount you've had drawn these last two weeks."

She met his gaze finally, hers golden and fierce. "I'm letting you go, McAlister. Now let _me_ do thisfor _you_."

Jack looked deep into her eyes, his darkening, before he nodded and let go of his hold on her arm. "Thank you, Chloe. Thank you for understanding."

She nodded and turned to leave, heading towards the door.

"When I've gotten control of this," his voice reached her from behind. "I _am_ coming back for you."

Chloe froze, eyes wide, a blush tinting her cheeks.

"I just thought I'd warn you."

A smile curled the edges of her lips. "That better be a promise, boss-man." And with that she left him on the rooftop and went to find the scientists that seemed to _live_ in the laboratory to have as much blood removed from her as humanly possible.

Even if she couldn't be there with Jack _physically_ to help him, she'd be with him every day as he injected himself she'd be helping him, in her own way.

* * *

Lex Luthor sat in the laboratory, looking at the vials of blood Chloe had had extracted from her a couple of days ago for Jack. He picked up one of the small things and shook his head, looking at the thick red liquid, somehow not surprised that while it'd helped Jack it'd done nothing for _him_. He'd injected himself with a vial and all it'd done was make him feel _sick_.

This parasite had changed something in Chloe that they couldn't even begin to understand. The tests that'd he'd just finished reading had indicated that Chloe was unable to have children with a human male. They was completely incompatible, fertility-wise, and while the blonde wasn't exactly compatible with Jack either, she was _more_ compatible with him, which meant that there was a _chance_ of them being able to procreate.

But if they did--how would the child come out? Would it be a humanoid with incredible powers like his or her parents, or would the child be born a monster, half/man half/human, like the Minotaur of Grecian Mythology? Had the dreaded Minotaur truly been just a myth and not some child born from a similar union?

Would Chloe even _want_ to take the risk?

_I won't even be alive to help her._

Lex closed his eyes, remembering his last test result. It'd stated that he had a maximum of a year to live. He hadn't thought that his time was so short--there were so many things he wanted to do--_needed_ to do--before he left this world in the hands of his father.

Like making sure that Chloe would be well taken care of.

The blonde hadn't realized it, didn't have the faintest clue, but he'd willed her everything he owned from the moment she was eighteen--a year ago--and old enough to own properties and businesses, to have_ money_ without a legal guardian. Everything that Lex owned, his houses, businesses, estates and cars, _everything_, everything that'd been in his family that he'd managed to keep, everything that'd been his mother's, _everything_ would legally become Chloe's upon his death.

He really couldn't think of anyone else to give it to.

He couldn't think of anyone else he'd _want_ to give it to.

"Hey Lex, what are you doing here?"

He looked up, somewhat surprised to see Chloe standing in front of him, face pale and sad. "Just thinking." Lex looked down at his watch and frowned when he saw that it was three o'clock in the morning. "What are _you_ doing here? It's pretty late."

"Jack's leaving."

"What?" The billionaire's gaze shot up at that and his frown grew darker. "_Why_?"

"Me." She sighed and sat down next to him, picking up one of the vials with her blood and looking at it in melancholy. "Apparently while my blood heals him, my just being there with him undoes everything. The parasite's taking control and, well, he's getting the same violent tendencies that the creatures in the cave had--the need to tear apart any male that comes close to me."

Well, Lex really couldn't think that Jack could truly blame all of that on the parasite. _Lex_ wasn't infected and _he_ sometimes let jealousy get the best of him whenever a male paid attention to Chloe. _He_ wanted to tear apart any man that so much as made her smile.

_Which makes you're needing to find her a man who can protect her when you're gone so ironic_.

"I don't want him to go, Lex." Chloe whispered the words that pierced Lex's heart. "But I understand _why_ he has to go, and I can't be selfish and expect him to stay, right?"

He reached over and took her free hand in his, squeezing. "Do you want me to talk to him? To make him stay? I'll find a way." And he would. If it truly made Chloe happy then he'd find a way to make sure Jack stayed right there--even if he had to use ill means of doing so.

"No." She squeezed back, looking up at him with a small, sad smile. "He needs to do this, and I won't stand in his way."

And thus Chloe reminded Lex about the reason why he was so in love with her. The girl was incredible.

"Can--can you have the scientists take more blood from me?" Chloe asked, looking somewhat shy. "I want Jack to have as much blood as he can. The longer my blood neutralizes _his_, the more chance he has of getting control and coming back."

Lex sighed and nodded. "Sure. Let's do this."

* * *

Tyler had been in the middle of a good old-fashioned erotic dream involving Chloe and Charlie when his irate brother shook him awake. The look Jack gave him made Tyler a little uncomfortable, wondering if he'd murmured anything in his sleep to give away what and _who_ he'd been dreaming about, but the words that escaped Jack's lips next made the dark-haired McAlister blink in surprise and shoot up into a sitting position in the bed.

"Leaving?" Tyler asked, throwing the sheets off of his body rapidly and getting out of bed, looking at his brother in worry. "Why? What happened? Did Luthor kick us out?"

"No." Jack shook his head. "I have to get away from Chloe if I'm going to get better. I've just come from telling Charlie and Top about my plans, and they're readying to leave with me."

"I'm coming too." Tyler shifted into action, grabbing his discarded shirt from where he'd thrown it on the ground before going to bed. "Just give me a bit to bathe and we're gone."

Jack nodded and left the room just as silently as he'd come.

Tyler watched his brother until the door closed. He shook his head, sighed, and then hurried to bathe.

* * *

Lois awake and realized that she was alone in Chloe's bed.

Stretching, realizing that there was activity going on outside despite the fact that it was still so early in the morning, the brunette got out of the bed and quickly ran her fingers through her hair before venturing out of Chloe's bedroom, giving a little gasp when she ran straight into Top, who'd been passing by her bedroom door with Charlie and holding a container of something in his hands.

"Lois," Top stopped and smiled at her. "What are you doing awake at this hour?"

Charlie smirked and shook her head knowingly at the tall, handsome, dark man.

Lois ran her fingers through her hair, a little self-conscious with the way he was grinning at her, before suddenly realizing that Charlie and Top were completely dressed and sporting their backpacks. "Where are you guys going? Does Chloe know?"

The smile disappeared from their faces as the two shared a look and then nodded, and Top finally answered. "Jack just woke us up a couple of minutes ago. He said that he was leaving, that Chloe and him had talked things over and it was better for his recuperation for them to be apart."

"And Chloe _agreed_ to this?" Lois asked, unable to believe that that was true. Her cousin was _in love_ with Jack McAlister, she mightn't have realized _how_ in love she was, but Lois knew for a fact that Chloe knew she'd gone over the deep end with the handsome leader of the spelunking team. So why would the blonde let him go just like that without a fight?

_Why_?

"Jack says that it's for his best." Charlie finally spoke, looking a little worried. "I don't understand how being away from Chloe is better for him, but Jack says that it is, and we trust Jack unconditionally."

Just like she did Chloe and yet Lois was filled with questions. "Where will you guys be going?"

"We don't know." Top answered again. "We're really following Jack's lead right now."

"But Jack said something about maybe visiting my brother, Tracy, and his family." Charlie winced at the look Top suddenly gave her, so apparently they weren't supposed to have told anyone that. "What? Top Buchannan, they deserved to know!"

He frowned at the petite blonde before turning to Lois. "Jack wanted to be in a place where he wouldn't run into Chloe. Tracy and Kelly have always let us hang there whenever we are in between jobs, and Jack and Tyler are nearly in _love_ with their seven year old daughter, so that would probably be the best place for them right now."

Charlie nodded. "Tracy and Jack were best friends growing up, and they spend time together whenever they are able to. And since Kelly left for Afghanistan some months ago, he's been having some problems with my little niece and has asked us to come over and give him a hand whenever we could. The place is a small town, there's a large forest that surrounds it, and a lake. It's a nice, serene place, and it'll be the best place for Jack to be away from stress-factors."

"Tyler told him that he should take up yoga." Top confessed with an amused expression. "And I think that he was joking when he said that, but Jack's taking him seriously."

"Kelly and Tracy are into yoga, Tracy is actually a part-time yoga instructor." Charlie made a face, showing what she thought of _that_, but then shook her head and sighed. "I'll keep in contact with you guys and let you know how things are going."

Lois smiled, grateful for that thoughtful gesture. "Thanks, I know that that will make Chloe feel better." She frowned slightly at the thing that Top was holding so carefully, as if frightened that it would break or something. "What's in that?"

"Chloe's blood." Top answered, handling the container with even _more_ care. "When she found out that Jack and us were leaving she went and got more taken out for him, and this container has about two hundred of the little vials with blood that he'll need."

"_Two hundred_?" Lois croaked. She knew that her cousin was healing-girl, but still, that was a _lot_ of blood to draw in one night!

"I think it's added to some of the older vials of blood that she'd already taken out." Charlie announced thoughtfully as if she'd read Lois' frantic thoughts, or maybe that same question had been bugging her as well from the moment she'd found out.

"I hope so." Lois hugged herself, feeling chilly. "That's a lot of blood to draw out--healing abilities or not." She paused. "Do you guys know where my cousin is?"

"Last I saw her she was going to talk to Jack in his room." Top pointed out. "Would you like me to talk you there?"

"No." Lois shook her head. "They're saying goodbye. God save whoever tries to interrupt _that_."

Charlie grinned suggestively.

Top just looked a little uncomfortable with the direction that their conversation was headed. He then turned to Lois with eyes wide. "I heard that you'd been fired from your job. What exactly are your plans now that you're out in the cold?"

Charlie looked just as interested in the answer.

"Well, I actually have a job." Lois smiled somewhat sheepishly. "I wrangled one out of Lex while I was having a hissy fit some hours ago. He was either very compassionate of my situation or scared shitless since I was throwing things around without discretion of who they hit." Her grin grew mischievous as she said that. "I told him that he was going to hire me and make me Chloe's assistant because the girl can't keep herself out of trouble. She needs someone to keep an eye out for her."

Charlie grinned at that.

So did Top.

"And Lex told me that I had the job and got the hell outta dodge before the waterworks could continue." Lois concluded, grin turning a bit more genuine. "So from Monday I'm going to be officially on Lexcorp's payroll, and I plan on being naughty and getting paid for it."

Charlie laughed.

Top raised an eyebrow. "Why am I suddenly absolutely frightened for Mr. Luthor?"

"Oh, he should be afraid, _very_ afraid_."_ Lois grinned.

Laughter echoed off of the walls of the lit hall.

* * *

Chloe slipped into Jack's room, relieved to find him still there, packing the little that he'd brought with him. She knew that he'd sensed her from the moment she'd opened the door, but still kept his back to her, ignoring her presence, but she wasn't insulted. Actually, she was glad for his behavior, it gave her time to just lean against the closed door and _admire_ the muscles beneath his shirt flex as he worked silently.

"Lex gave the container filled with the vials of blood to Top." She broke the silence.

He paused before closing the cover of his backpack and turning to her, eyes now normal, expression blank. "Why are you here?"

"Because," she whispered, pushing away from the door and going towards him. "I didn't want you to go without saying goodbye." The blonde woman looked up at him as he tensed with each step she took towards him, and she knew that what she was doing was wrong, that he was desperate to be away from her, but she wouldn't have been able to live with herself if she didn't do this right now.

"Chloe?" Jack whispered when the blonde stopped in front of him and stood on her tiptoes, hand on his cheek, thumb caressing the stubble there. "What are you _doing_?"

Closing her eyes, Chloe pressed her lips to his and whimpered when something in him _snapped_ and Jack's arms encircled her, pulling her to him roughly, his hands panning the expanse of her back, traveling up and down, rubbing and squeezing, claiming her as she'd hoped he would.

Throwing her arms around his neck, Chloe pulled herself _closer_, gasping into his kiss as his hands ventured heavily down the small of her back and cupped her ass, lifting her up against him, causing her to wrap her legs around his waist as he turned and slammed her back against the wall.

Breath leaving her in seconds, Chloe felt dizzy, but that was probably the fault of Jack as he moved against her, his hardness sliding against her soft femininity, something within them soaring to life as they seemed to be on _fire_. She nibbled on his bottom lip and the complain that'd been in her throat when he'd pulled away was choked when he pressed his mouth to the side of her neck, his stubble playing against the soft skin as he nibbled and licked and _sucked_, leaving little marks all over her skin, pink with arousal.

"_Chloe_…" His voice was hoarse, nearly animalistic against her skin as his hands ran under the back of her shirt and met flesh, trailing his short nails against her skin. "I'm not going to stop. I'm not going to--."

"_Don't_." And she'd reclaimed his mouth, wincing when she tasted blood, realizing that she'd nicked his lip with her teeth, but Jack just whimpered into the kiss, running his tongue against hers as the blood continued to mix in the kiss and their hands continued to roam the other's upper torsos.

The sound of her shirt tearing was the only forewarning Jack gave Chloe before she was suddenly on her back on the bed, with him upon her, mouths never having left each other, and she hurriedly undid the buttons of his shirt before growing frustrated and following his example and tearing the rest off, feeling a dark satisfaction within her at the sound of material tearing and buttons hitting the tiled floor.

It was rough and animalistic, unlike anything Chloe would have ever thought she'd enjoy sexually, but something inside of her whimpered in pleasure as they continued to tear at each other's clothes until they were naked, fighting for dominance, the male in Jack growling for her to submit, and the female in Chloe snarling back before biting harder on his already bruised bottom lip, and the taste of blood seemed to strengthen the frenzy they were in.

A cry was torn from her throat when he entered her with a harsh thrust, and then everything was fire and lava, heat that rose from their bodies and burnt as they moved together, their mouths branding each other as Chloe ran her fingernails down his back, the scent of blood, the delicious hiss deep within his throat, and the feeling of dampness in her fingernails proving that her scratches had gone deep.

Chloe pulled one of those hands away from his bleeding back and brought a finger, red with his blood, to her lips, closing her eyes as she tasted _his_ blood for the first time, whimpering in pleasure at the tangy delicacy that hit the back of her throat potently, swirling down into her and burning like only the purest of vodka.

Jack _roared_ and suddenly he'd pulled out and she was flipped around, kneeling on the bed and he was within her, arms encircling her from behind as he nibbled the skin of her shoulder and moved as one with her, branding the young blonde from within.

His teeth scratched the surface of her skin and she meowed, tilting her head to the side, granting him access, finally submitting to him. Chloe whimpered in pleasure as he trailed bites over the expanse of her shoulder and up her throat--cried out when one of his hands traveled down her flat stomach and cupped her, thumb teasing her as he continued to move relentlessly within her, causing stars to appear behind her eyes.

"_Jack_…!" She cried, closing her eyes for a second and opening them again, blinking when she saw the room lighter and in better detail, realizing that she'd gone predator again.

"_Ch…lo…e…!_" His voice was so hoarse and hard to the ears that she knew that so had _he_.

And suddenly he pressed harder with his thumb and she was screaming as the world spun and she exploded, spasming around his hard length, body shaking terribly as he roared in her ear and began to move urgently within her, and she felt it when he shattered and bit down on her shoulder enough to pierce the skin and draw blood as he came along with her.

"_Jack!"_

_"Chloe!_"

And when it was finally over they collapsed on the bed in a tangle of arms and legs, bodies sore and yet sated as Jack drew her up against his naked body, still within her. "I'm going to come back for you." He promised, voice like sandpaper.

Chloe's only answer was to press a kiss to the naked skin of his chest before closing her eyes and breathing in his scent, feeling sleep begin to take over again. She knew that when she awoke he'd be gone, but as they lay facing each other, with their arms around the other, hearts beating as one, it was enough.

For now, it was enough.

Taking in another whiff of the scent of his skin, smiling softly when she felt Jack press a tender kiss to the side of her face, Chloe allowed herself to fall asleep.

* * *

"Thank you for your help. You didn't have to help me but you did, and yet I have something else to ask of you before I go." The tall man finally spoke. "Take care of her."

Lex realized how hard it was for the other man to say that, to do this, to leave Chloe with him. He looked at the sandy-blonde man standing in front of him as Lois said goodbye to the others as they filed into the car that would take them to the airport. Agony was visible in Jack's eyes, and the way he kept sending glances at the building behind Lex proved that he was still tracking Chloe's breaths as she slept.

"I'm dying."

Jack froze suddenly, turning to look at Lex in horror. "What are you talking about?"

"I have cancer." Lex admitted to the first one other than the annoying and nosey Lois Lane. "My doctors give me no more than a year to live." He paused, letting that information sink in. "So you _better_ get control of yourself by then. I—I don't want Chloe to be alone."

Jack frowned slightly for a moment, looking at Lex as if examining him. "You love her."

"Since she was in high school." The billionaire confessed with a sad smile. "But it wasn't meant to be."

"She could heal you."

"She could." He agreed slowly. "But I'm another one of those meteor mutants she told you about. And if she healed me anymore, I'd drain her completely of her healing abilities--and I'd never do that to her. They're what keep her safe."

Jack was silent again, looking quickly at the building behind them before turning to Lex. "I will make sure that she will not be alone, _ever_."

Lex smiled, truly grateful. "That's all I ask." He reached out his hand, not only was he offering a truce, but he was showing his trust in the other man to take care of Chloe when he wouldn't be there to do so himself.

The taller man looked at the hand offered before shaking it firmly. "I _will_ be back for her."

Lex nodded. "Good."

And with that, Jack McAlister and his spelunking team, got into the taxi and left.

Lois sighed as she appeared by Lex's side. "Do you think they're doing the right thing? Leaving?"

He kept his gaze on the taxi as it quickly disappeared in the distance. "I don't know, Lois. I really don't know."

* * *

Later that day, when Jack was so far away she couldn't even feel him anymore, Chloe finally emerged from her room, and met Lex and Lois in the dinning room, where they were having a late lunch.

"Chloe!" Lois started, standing up from the table like Lex.

"I want you to teach me all that you know about self-defense and fighting." Chloe surprised her cousin by saying. "Jack is doing what he must to help him get control over his parasite, and now I must do what _I_ can to refine the abilities _mine gave me_."

Lex smiled from where he was standing by the head of the table. "I agree a hundred per cent."

Lois frowned, looking from Lex to Chloe and then sighed in defeat. "Okay Cuz, I'll teach you what I know."

For the first time that day, Chloe smiled.

* * *

_I wonder what has you so amused._

Jack looked out of the window of the plane as he fingered the ring Chloe hadn't even realized he'd stolen, which he kept around his neck on a chain. He could feel her satisfaction and amusement, and was glad that she was fine, that she was strong, and wasn't letting this pull her down.

"_Please put your seats in the upright position and fasten your seatbelts for landing_." The stewardess spoke over the speakerphones.

Jack sighed as he did as told.

He didn't know if he'd be able to keep his promise to Chloe, that he'd return to find her.

But he'd try.

Jack winced as his world shook slightly, the muscles in his arms and hands shifting _visibly_ under his skin.

A dark, ominous feeling filled his stomach.

Somehow, he knew it just wouldn't be enough.

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**The End---For Now?  
**


End file.
